If you have experience with the standard .net web services you
may find useful the following table of comparison between WCF Web Services and Standard Web Services.
| Standard Web Services | WCF Web Services | |
|---|---|---|
| client for the service are generated by | command-line tool WSDL.EXE | ServiceMetadata tool(svcutil.exe) |
| class attribute | [WebService] | [ServiceContract] |
| method exposed to client attribute | [WebMethod] | [OperationContract] |
| supported operations | one-way
request-response |
one-way,
request-response, duplex |
| namespace for serialization | System.Xml.Serialization | System.Runtime.Serialization |
| Encoding | XML 1.0
MTOM DIME Custom |
XML 1.0
MTOM Binary Custom |
| accessed through | HTTP,
TCP, Custom |
HTTP
TCP Named pipes MSMQ P2P Custom |
| Exception Handling | Unhandled exceptions are returned to the client as SOAP faults. | unhandled exceptions are returned to the client. |
| protocols | security | security
transaction reliable messaging |
| can be hosted in | IIS | IIS
windows activation service Windows service Self-hosting |
It seems that WCF offers much more portability and flexibility to develop a service when comparing to web service.