The Java EE 5 Tutorial

Accessing Elements of a Message

The next step in creating a message is to access its parts so that content can be added. There are two ways to do this. The SOAPMessage object message, created in the preceding code fragment, is the place to start.

The first way to access the parts of the message is to work your way through the structure of the message. The message contains a SOAPPart object, so you use the getSOAPPart method of message to retrieve it:

SOAPPart soapPart = message.getSOAPPart();

Next you can use the getEnvelope method of soapPart to retrieve the SOAPEnvelope object that it contains.

SOAPEnvelope envelope = soapPart.getEnvelope();

You can now use the getHeader and getBody methods of envelope to retrieve its empty SOAPHeader and SOAPBody objects.

SOAPHeader header = envelope.getHeader();
SOAPBody body = envelope.getBody();

The second way to access the parts of the message is to retrieve the message header and body directly, without retrieving the SOAPPart or SOAPEnvelope. To do so, use the getSOAPHeader and getSOAPBody methods of SOAPMessage:

SOAPHeader header = message.getSOAPHeader();
SOAPBody body = message.getSOAPBody();

This example of a SAAJ client does not use a SOAP header, so you can delete it. (You will see more about headers later.) Because all SOAPElement objects, including SOAPHeader objects, are derived from the Node interface, you use the method Node.detachNode to delete header.