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><A
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>4. Common XML-RPC Interfaces</A
></H1
><P
>Several XML-RPC servers provide built-in methods. These aren't
part of XML-RPC itself, but they make handy add-ons.</P
><DIV
CLASS="section"
><H2
CLASS="section"
><A
NAME="xmlrpc-howto-api-introspection"
>4.1. Introspection: Discovering Server APIs</A
></H2
><P
>Edd Dumbill <A
HREF="http://xmlrpc.usefulinc.com/doc/reserved.html"
TARGET="_top"
>proposed</A
>
the following set of methods:</P
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><TR
><TD
><PRE
CLASS="synopsis"
><SPAN
CLASS="returnvalue"
>array</SPAN
> <TT
CLASS="function"
>system.listMethods</TT
> ()
<SPAN
CLASS="returnvalue"
>string</SPAN
> <TT
CLASS="function"
>system.methodHelp</TT
> (<SPAN
CLASS="type"
>string</SPAN
> <TT
CLASS="parameter"
><I
>methodName</I
></TT
>)
<SPAN
CLASS="returnvalue"
>array</SPAN
> <TT
CLASS="function"
>system.methodSignature</TT
> (<SPAN
CLASS="type"
>string</SPAN
> <TT
CLASS="parameter"
><I
>methodName</I
></TT
>)</PRE
></TD
></TR
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><P
>If a server supports these methods, you can ask it to print out
some documentation:</P
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><TR
><TD
><PRE
CLASS="programlisting"
>import xmlrpclib
server = xmlrpclib.Server("http://xmlrpc-c.sourceforge.net/api/sample.php")
for method in server.system.listMethods():
print method
print server.system.methodHelp(method)
print</PRE
></TD
></TR
></TABLE
><P
>These methods are currently supported by servers written in
PHP, C and Microsoft .NET. Partial introspection support is included
in recent updates to UserLand Frontier. Introspection support for
Perl, Python and Java is available at the <A
HREF="http://xmlrpc-c.sourceforge.net/hacks.php"
TARGET="_top"
>XML-RPC
Hacks</A
> page. Please feel free to add introspection support to
other XML-RPC servers!</P
><P
>Various client-side tools (documentation generators, wrapper
generators, and so on) can be found at the XML-RPC Hacks page as
well.</P
></DIV
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CLASS="section"
><H2
CLASS="section"
><A
NAME="xmlrpc-howto-api-boxcarring"
>4.2. Boxcarring: Sending Multiple Requests at Once</A
></H2
><P
>If you're writing an XML-RPC client which makes lots of small
function calls, you may discover that your round-trip time is fairly
high, thanks to Internet backbone latency. Some servers allow you to
batch up multiple requests using the following function:</P
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><TD
><PRE
CLASS="synopsis"
><SPAN
CLASS="returnvalue"
>array</SPAN
> <TT
CLASS="function"
>system.multicall</TT
> (<SPAN
CLASS="type"
>array</SPAN
> <TT
CLASS="parameter"
><I
>calls</I
></TT
>)</PRE
></TD
></TR
></TABLE
><P
>You can find more information in the <A
HREF="http://www.xmlrpc.com/discuss/msgReader$1208"
TARGET="_top"
>system.multicall
RFC</A
>.</P
><P
>This method is currently supported by servers written in C and
UserLand Frontier. Servers written in Python and Perl can use the
code at the <A
HREF="http://xmlrpc-c.sourceforge.net/hacks.php"
TARGET="_top"
>XML-RPC
Hacks</A
> page.</P
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