Reducing bandwidth in XML web services: a DeltaXML solution
Web services are based on the use of XML as the communication data format. In many cases only small files are transmitted so there is no bandwidth problem, but where large files need to be interchanged there can be a bandwidth problem.
One approach to reducing the bandwidth requirements of a web service which relies on large XML data sets is to interchange just delta files rather than re-transmitting large files every time a change occurs. This is particularly effective in cases where a large file is being processed by a web service under control of a remote user. It would consume large amounts of bandwidth and take too long to keep re-transmitting such a file. It is much more effective to set up a delta pipeline and transmit just the changes.
DeltaXML can be used in such situations because it generates a delta file which can be re-combined with either of the original files to generate the other original file. So a small change at one end of the pipeline can be communicated to the other end as a delta file. The delta file could be encapsulated in a SOAP envelope because it is pure XML.
Delta files of filtered data sets can be useful for Increasing security for XML transmissions as they allow you to transmit data that should not be sent in a single translations, such as name and passwords, in multiple transmissions that can be resynchronized on receipt.