Web application and Web Services - Whats the diff?

  • Thread starter Thread starter Peter Q
  • Start date Start date
P

Peter Q

As the title suggests,

what are the differences between a web app and a web service? What exactly
IS a web service??

thanks

Peter
 
Hi
A web application has a user interface, you see a web application using a
internet browser.

Web services do not have a user interface, you can use a web application or
a windows application or any other application to connect to a web serivice
and provide a user interface.

Cheers
Benny
 
A web application is basically an HTML version of a standard user interface.
Because it's HTML-based, it isn't as rich, but you have the concept of the
lifetime of the application rather than a particular view (i.e. when you go
from screen to screen, generally, your choices, etc. are maintained
throughout your session.) A web service is really just a remote API that
allows for the passing and receiving of objects regardless of language, as
objects are described in XML, rather than a language-specific format. Web
service calls are inherently stateless (make two calls, and each call will
have a different session), although you can enable session usage. There is
a caveat to that (each call *is* a new session, but with client coding, the
sessions can be remapped to the original)

In a nutshell, one is a true user interface, and the other is an API.
 
Reading it again, let me clarify: web apps *can* be stateless, and web
services *can* have state, but what I generally see in a web app is one with
state, and vice versa for web services (although one WS I have worked on
does enable state). It's a matter of choice, but I am speaking of typical
usage insofar as I have seen myself.
 
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