Methods, systems, and articles of manufacture consistent with certain
principles related to the present invention enable a computing system to
layer the packaging and deployment of a web service endpoint on a
standard servlet component model. To define a web service endpoint, the
computing system may develop a service endpoint class that implements a
configured service endpoint interface. The interface and endpoint class
may be packaged by the computing system into an archive file. The
computing system may use the information stored in the archive file to
define the service endpoint modify the archive file with class
information associated with the defined service endpoint. The modified
archive file may be deployed on a container operating within the
computing system. Further, the computing system may produce a WSDL based
description of the defined service endpoint and export the document such
that a remote client may use the information contained in the document to
locate and remotely invoke methods on the defined service endpoint.