Web services product complies with industry efforts Parasoft on Tuesday is releasing SOAPtest 2.5, an upgrade of the company’s Web services testing tool that sports security enhancements and adherence to upcoming WS-I test tool functions, the company said.Looking to prevent errors early in the development stage, the product verifies aspects of a Web service ranging from WSDL validation to functional and performance testing, according to Parasoft.Version 2.5 tests for a variety of security factors through compliance with the WS-Security specification, which includes adherence to X509, user name security tokens, and SAML, Parasoft said. Compliance with XML Digital Signature and XML Encryption also is tested, the company said. Security is critical to Web services to enable users to move from internally deployed Web services to using the services to interact with other businesses, said Jeehong Min, technical leader for software at Parasoft. “WS-Security is the standard that people have agreed upon as a security layer for Web services. It’s the XML message-level security layer,” Min said.The product features a WS-I Analyzer tool to verify WSDL and SOAP traffic for interoperability. The tool conforms with the upcoming WS-I Testing Tools 1.0 tools from the Web Services Interoperability Organization, Parasoft said. The WS-I tools are intended to test for compliance with the WS-I Basic Profile 1.0 guidelines for Web services interoperability.The WS-I Testing Tools 1.0, which will feature Analyzer and Monitor tools, are due in a month from the WS-I, for the C# and Java languages. Also featured in SOAPtest 2.5 is testing for MIME attachments, including meeting SOAP with Attachments and OASIS ebXML specifications and receiving both text/XML and binary attachments, Parasoft said.Enhanced load balancing in Version 2.5 includes SNMP and Windows monitors. Customizable HTML reports and detailed histograms are featured as well. Java Message Service (JMS) testing is supported also.Available for the Windows 2000 and XP platforms as well as for Linux and Solaris, pricing for SOAPtest 2.5 starts at $3,995. Software Development