Question

A developer asks:

• What is the distinction between Stateless and Stateful in the Service Package form?
• What is the impact of the End requestor when done check box on the SOAP Service rule?

Answer

On the Context tab of the Service Package form, select Stateful when you want to maintain a clipboard across second and subsequent service requests.

Select Stateless to perform a simple calculation from inputs: the service request arrives, your activity performs a calculation, then send the response, and nothing you've done is needed to process later service requests..

On the Service tab of the Service SOAP form, the End requestor when done check box has no impact on stateless services. Regardless of the check box setting, when a service completes, the requestor is not destroyed so that Process Commander can re-use it for later service requests, thereby avoiding the overhead of creating another requestor.

For stateful services, select the End requestor when done check box only on a service that is the last one of a series of requests.

This indicates that you're finished with the requestor, so that it can be destroyed. Earlier requests in the series have the box cleared, so that the same requestor is used throughout.