CXF Component

The cxf: component provides integration with Apache CXF for connecting to JAX-WS services hosted in CXF.

Maven users will need to add the following dependency to their pom.xml for this component:

URI format

Where cxfEndpoint represents a bean ID that references a bean in the Spring bean registry. With this URI format, most of the endpoint details are specified in the bean definition.

Where someAddress specifies the CXF endpoint's address. With this URI format, most of the endpoint details are specified using options.

For either style above, you can append options to the URI as follows:

Options

The serviceName and portName are QNames, so if you provide them be sure to prefix them with their {namespace} as shown in the examples above.

The descriptions of the dataformats

You can determine the data format mode of an exchange by retrieving the exchange property, CamelCXFDataFormat. The exchange key constant is defined in org.apache.camel.component.cxf.CxfConstants.DATA_FORMAT_PROPERTY.

How to enable CXF's LoggingOutInterceptor in MESSAGE mode

CXF's LoggingOutInterceptor outputs outbound message that goes on the wire to logging system (Java Util Logging). Since the LoggingOutInterceptor is in PRE_STREAM phase (but PRE_STREAM phase is removed in MESSAGE mode), you have to configure LoggingOutInterceptor to be run during the WRITE phase. The following is an example.

Description of relayHeaders option

There are in-band and out-of-band on-the-wire headers from the perspective of a JAXWS WSDL-first developer.

The in-band headers are headers that are explicitly defined as part of the WSDL binding contract for an endpoint such as SOAP headers.

The out-of-band headers are headers that are serialized over the wire, but are not explicitly part of the WSDL binding contract.

Headers relaying/filtering is bi-directional.

When a route has a CXF endpoint and the developer needs to have on-the-wire headers, such as SOAP headers, be relayed along the route to be consumed say by another JAXWS endpoint, then relayHeaders should be set to true, which is the default value.

Available only in POJO mode

The relayHeaders=true express an intent to relay the headers. The actual decision on whether a given header is relayed is delegated to a pluggable instance that implements the MessageHeadersRelay interface. A concrete implementation of MessageHeadersRelay will be consulted to decide if a header needs to be relayed or not. There is already an implementation of SoapMessageHeadersRelay which binds itself to well-known SOAP name spaces. Currently only out-of-band headers are filtered, and in-band headers will always be relayed when relayHeaders=true. If there is a header on the wire, whose name space is unknown to the runtime, then a fall back DefaultMessageHeadersRelay will be used, which simply allows all headers to be relayed.

The relayHeaders=false setting asserts that all headers in-band and out-of-band will be dropped.

You can plugin your own MessageHeadersRelay implementations overriding or adding additional ones to the list of relays. In order to override a preloaded relay instance just make sure that your MessageHeadersRelay implementation services the same name spaces as the one you looking to override. Also note, that the overriding relay has to service all of the name spaces as the one you looking to override, or else a runtime exception on route start up will be thrown as this would introduce an ambiguity in name spaces to relay instance mappings.

Take a look at the tests that show how you'd be able to relay/drop headers here:

https://svn.apache.org/repos/asf/camel/branches/camel-1.x/components/camel-cxf/src/test/java/org/apache/camel/component/cxf/soap/headers/CxfMessageHeadersRelayTest.java

Changes since Release 2.0

• POJO and PAYLOAD modes are supported. In POJO mode, only out-of-band message headers are available for filtering as the in-band headers have been processed and removed from header list by CXF. The in-band headers are incorporated into the MessageContentList in POJO mode. The camel-cxf component does make any attempt to remove the in-band headers from the MessageContentList. If filtering of in-band headers is required, please use PAYLOAD mode or plug in a (pretty straightforward) CXF interceptor/JAXWS Handler to the CXF endpoint.

• The Message Header Relay mechanism has been merged into CxfHeaderFilterStrategy. The relayHeaders option, its semantics, and default value remain the same, but it is a property of CxfHeaderFilterStrategy.
  Here is an example of configuring it.

  Then, your endpoint can reference the CxfHeaderFilterStrategy.

• The MessageHeadersRelay interface has changed slightly and has been renamed to MessageHeaderFilter. It is a property of CxfHeaderFilterStrategy. Here is an example of configuring user defined Message Header Filters:

• Other than relayHeaders, there are new properties that can be configured in CxfHeaderFilterStrategy.

  Name	Required	Description
  relayHeaders	No	All message headers will be processed by Message Header Filters Type: boolean Default: true
  relayAllMessageHeaders	No	All message headers will be propagated (without processing by Message Header Filters) Type: boolean Default: false
  allowFilterNamespaceClash	No	If two filters overlap in activation namespace, the property control how it should be handled. If the value is true, last one wins. If the value is false, it will throw an exception Type: boolean Default: false

  Configure the CXF endpoints with Spring

  You can configure the CXF endpoint with the Spring configuration file shown below, and you can also embed the endpoint into the camelContext tags. When you are invoking the service endpoint, you can set the operationName and operationNamespace headers to explicitly state which operation you are calling.

  Be sure to include the JAX-WS schemaLocation attribute specified on the root beans element. This allows CXF to validate the file and is required. Also note the namespace declarations at the end of the <cxf:cxfEndpoint/> tag--these are required because the combined {namespace}localName syntax is presently not supported for this tag's attribute values.

  The cxf:cxfEndpoint element supports many additional attributes:

  Name	Value
  PortName	The endpoint name this service is implementing, it maps to the wsdl:port@name. In the format of ns:PORT_NAME where ns is a namespace prefix valid at this scope.
  serviceName	The service name this service is implementing, it maps to the wsdl:service@name. In the format of ns:SERVICE_NAME where ns is a namespace prefix valid at this scope.
  wsdlURL	The location of the WSDL. Can be on the classpath, file system, or be hosted remotely.
  bindingId	The bindingId for the service model to use.
  address	The service publish address.
  bus	The bus name that will be used in the JAX-WS endpoint.
  serviceClass	The class name of the SEI (Service Endpoint Interface) class which could have JSR181 annotation or not.

  It also supports many child elements:

  Name	Value
  cxf:inInterceptors	The incoming interceptors for this endpoint. A list of <bean> or <ref>.
  cxf:inFaultInterceptors	The incoming fault interceptors for this endpoint. A list of <bean> or <ref>.
  cxf:outInterceptors	The outgoing interceptors for this endpoint. A list of <bean> or <ref>.
  cxf:outFaultInterceptors	The outgoing fault interceptors for this endpoint. A list of <bean> or <ref>.
  cxf:properties	A properties map which should be supplied to the JAX-WS endpoint. See below.
  cxf:handlers	A JAX-WS handler list which should be supplied to the JAX-WS endpoint. See below.
  cxf:dataBinding	You can specify the which DataBinding will be use in the endpoint. This can be supplied using the Spring <bean class="MyDataBinding"/> syntax.
  cxf:binding	You can specify the BindingFactory for this endpoint to use. This can be supplied using the Spring <bean class="MyBindingFactory"/> syntax.
  cxf:features	The features that hold the interceptors for this endpoint. A list of {{<bean>}}s or {{<ref>}}s
  cxf:schemaLocations	The schema locations for endpoint to use. A list of {{<schemaLocation>}}s
  cxf:serviceFactory	The service factory for this endpoint to use. This can be supplied using the Spring <bean class="MyServiceFactory"/> syntax

   

You can find more advanced examples that show how to provide interceptors, properties and handlers on the CXF JAX-WS Configuration page.

NOTE
You can use cxf:properties to set the camel-cxf endpoint's dataFormat and setDefaultBus properties from spring configuration file.

Configuring the CXF Endpoints with Apache Aries Blueprint.

Since camel 2.8 there is support for utilizing aries blueprint dependency injection for your CXF endpoints.
The schema utilized is very similar to the spring schema so the transition is fairly transparent.

Example

Currently the endpoint element is the first supported CXF namespacehandler.

You can also use the bean references just as in spring

How to make the camel-cxf component use log4j instead of java.util.logging

CXF's default logger is java.util.logging. If you want to change it to log4j, proceed as follows. Create a file, in the classpath, named META-INF/cxf/org.apache.cxf.logger. This file should contain the fully-qualified name of the class, org.apache.cxf.common.logging.Log4jLogger, with no comments, on a single line.

How to let camel-cxf response message with xml start document

If you are using some SOAP client such as PHP, you will get this kind of error, because CXF doesn't add the XML start document "<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>"

To resolved this issue, you just need to tell StaxOutInterceptor to write the XML start document for you.

You can add a customer interceptor like this and configure it into you camel-cxf endpontOr adding a message header for it like this if you are using Camel 2.4.

How to override the CXF producer address from message header

The camel-cxf producer supports to override the services address by setting the message with the key of "CamelDestinationOverrideUrl".

How to consume a message from a camel-cxf endpoint in POJO data format

The camel-cxf endpoint consumer POJO data format is based on the cxf invoker, so the message header has a property with the name of CxfConstants.OPERATION_NAME and the message body is a list of the SEI method parameters.

How to prepare the message for the camel-cxf endpoint in POJO data format

The camel-cxf endpoint producer is based on the cxf client API. First you need to specify the operation name in the message header, then add the method parameters to a list, and initialize the message with this parameter list. The response message's body is a messageContentsList, you can get the result from that list.

If you don't specify the operation name in the message header, CxfProducer will try to use the defaultOperationName from CxfEndpoint, if there is no defaultOperationName set on CxfEndpoint, it will pickup the first operationName from the Operation list.

If you want to get the object array from the message body, you can get the body using message.getbody(Object[].class), as follows:

How to deal with the message for a camel-cxf endpoint in PAYLOAD data format

PAYLOAD means that you process the payload message from the SOAP envelope. You can use the Header.HEADER_LIST as the key to set or get the SOAP headers and use the List<Element> to set or get SOAP body elements.
Message.getBody() will return an org.apache.camel.component.cxf.CxfPayload object, which has getters for SOAP message headers and Body elements. This change enables decoupling the native CXF message from the Camel message.

How to get and set SOAP headers in POJO mode

POJO means that the data format is a "list of Java objects" when the Camel-cxf endpoint produces or consumes Camel exchanges. Even though Camel expose message body as POJOs in this mode, Camel-cxf still provides access to read and write SOAP headers. However, since CXF interceptors remove in-band SOAP headers from Header list after they have been processed, only out-of-band SOAP headers are available to Camel-cxf in POJO mode.

The following example illustrate how to get/set SOAP headers. Suppose we have a route that forwards from one Camel-cxf endpoint to another. That is, SOAP Client -> Camel -> CXF service. We can attach two processors to obtain/insert SOAP headers at (1) before request goes out to the CXF service and (2) before response comes back to the SOAP Client. Processor (1) and (2) in this example are InsertRequestOutHeaderProcessor and InsertResponseOutHeaderProcessor. Our route looks like this:

SOAP headers are propagated to and from Camel Message headers. The Camel message header name is "org.apache.cxf.headers.Header.list" which is a constant defined in CXF (org.apache.cxf.headers.Header.HEADER_LIST). The header value is a List of CXF SoapHeader objects (org.apache.cxf.binding.soap.SoapHeader). The following snippet is the InsertResponseOutHeaderProcessor (that insert a new SOAP header in the response message). The way to access SOAP headers in both InsertResponseOutHeaderProcessor and InsertRequestOutHeaderProcessor are actually the same. The only difference between the two processors is setting the direction of the inserted SOAP header.

How to get and set SOAP headers in PAYLOAD mode

We've already shown how to access SOAP message (CxfPayload object) in PAYLOAD mode (See "How to deal with the message for a camel-cxf endpoint in PAYLOAD data format").

Once you obtain a CxfPayload object, you can invoke the CxfPayload.getHeaders() method that returns a List of DOM Elements (SOAP headers).

Since Camel 2.16.0, you can also use the same way as described in sub-chapter "How to get and set SOAP headers in POJO mode" to set or get the SOAP headers. So, you can use now the header "org.apache.cxf.headers.Header.list" to get and set a list of SOAP headers.This does also mean that if you have a route that forwards from one Camel-cxf endpoint to another (SOAP Client -> Camel -> CXF service), now also the SOAP headers sent by the SOAP client are forwarded to the CXF service. If you do not want that these headers are forwarded you have to remove them in the Camel header "org.apache.cxf.headers.Header.list".

SOAP headers are not available in MESSAGE mode

SOAP headers are not available in MESSAGE mode as SOAP processing is skipped.

How to throw a SOAP Fault from Camel

If you are using a camel-cxf endpoint to consume the SOAP request, you may need to throw the SOAP Fault from the camel context.
Basically, you can use the throwFault DSL to do that; it works for POJO, PAYLOAD and MESSAGE data format.
You can define the soap fault like this

Then throw it as you likeIf your CXF endpoint is working in the MESSAGE data format, you could set the the SOAP Fault message in the message body and set the response code in the message header.Same for using POJO data format. You can set the SOAPFault on the out body and also indicate it's a fault by calling Message.setFault(true):

How to propagate a camel-cxf endpoint's request and response context

cxf client API provides a way to invoke the operation with request and response context. If you are using a camel-cxf endpoint producer to invoke the outside web service, you can set the request context and get response context with the following code:

Attachment Support

POJO Mode: Both SOAP with Attachment and MTOM are supported (see example in Payload Mode for enabling MTOM).  However, SOAP with Attachment is not tested.  Since attachments are marshalled and unmarshalled into POJOs, users typically do not need to deal with the attachment themself.  Attachments are propagated to Camel message's attachments if the MTOM is not enabled, since 2.12.3.  So, it is possible to retreive attachments by Camel Message API

.

Payload Mode: MTOM is supported since 2.1. Attachments can be retrieved by Camel Message APIs mentioned above. SOAP with Attachment (SwA) is supported and attachments can be retrieved since 2.5. SwA is the default (same as setting the CXF endpoint property "mtom-enabled" to false). 

To enable MTOM, set the CXF endpoint property "mtom-enabled" to true. (I believe you can only do it with Spring.)

You can produce a Camel message with attachment to send to a CXF endpoint in Payload mode.You can also consume a Camel message received from a CXF endpoint in Payload mode.Message Mode: Attachments are not supported as it does not process the message at all.

CXF_MESSAGE Mode: MTOM is supported, and Attachments can be retrieved by Camel Message APIs mentioned above. Note that when receiving a multipart (i.e. MTOM) message the default SOAPMessage to String converter will provide the complete multipart payload on the body. If you require just the SOAP XML as a String, you can set the message body with message.getSOAPPart(), and Camel convert can do the rest of work for you.

Streaming Support in PAYLOAD mode

In 2.8.2, the camel-cxf component now supports streaming of incoming messages when using PAYLOAD mode. Previously, the incoming messages would have been completely DOM parsed. For large messages, this is time consuming and uses a significant amount of memory. Starting in 2.8.2, the incoming messages can remain as a javax.xml.transform.Source while being routed and, if nothing modifies the payload, can then be directly streamed out to the target destination. For common "simple proxy" use cases (example: from("cxf:...").to("cxf:...")), this can provide very significant performance increases as well as significantly lowered memory requirements.

However, there are cases where streaming may not be appropriate or desired. Due to the streaming nature, invalid incoming XML may not be caught until later in the processing chain. Also, certain actions may require the message to be DOM parsed anyway (like WS-Security or message tracing and such) in which case the advantages of the streaming is limited. At this point, there are two ways to control the streaming:

• Endpoint property: you can add "allowStreaming=false" as an endpoint property to turn the streaming on/off.

• Component property: the CxfComponent object also has an allowStreaming property that can set the default for endpoints created from that component.

Global system property: you can add a system property of "org.apache.camel.component.cxf.streaming" to "false" to turn if off. That sets the global default, but setting the endpoint property above will override this value for that endpoint.

Using the generic CXF Dispatch mode

From 2.8.0, the camel-cxf component supports the generic CXF dispatch mode that can transport messages of arbitrary structures (i.e., not bound to a specific XML schema). To use this mode, you simply omit specifying the wsdlURL and serviceClass attributes of the CXF endpoint.

It is noted that the default CXF dispatch client does not send a specific SOAPAction header. Therefore, when the target service requires a specific SOAPAction value, it is supplied in the Camel header using the key SOAPAction (case-insensitive).

 

See Also

• Configuring Camel
• Component
• Endpoint
• Getting Started