Re: [SOAP] soapclient using https randomly closes connection

Sriram Natarajan wrote:
> 
> 
> Bernhard Ege wrote:
>> I am using php 5.2.9 (solaris) and have access to a .NET webservice 
>> that I
>> have to access using https.
>>
>> In most cases, accessing it works just fine, but every now and again,
>> SoapClient closes the connection before actually having transfered the
>> request, erroring with "could not connect to host ...".
>>
>> I have captured the actual communication using snoop and examined the 
>> result
>> in wireshark and I see that the tcp connection to the webservice is
>> established correct, but before the request is transmitted, SoapClient
>> closes the tcp-connection which is acknowledged by the webservice 
>> which also
>> resets the TCP connection.
>>
>> When I disable the caching of the WSDL file for SoapClient, I get these
>> errors (not always, only sometimes):
>>
>> Warning: SoapClient::SoapClient() [soapclient.soapclient]: failed to 
>> create
>> an SSL context in /space/hom
>>
>> Warning: SoapClient::SoapClient() [soapclient.soapclient]: Failed to 
>> enable
>> crypto in /space/home
>>
> This warning suggests that PHP is unable to create a SSL stream context 
> . By default, if you disable caching, PHP has to download the wsdl to 
> your /tmp directory. Is is possible you are running out of disk space in 
> /tmp.
> - Sriram

Thank you for the response, but there is plenty of space to save the 
WSDL file. Also, if I cache the wsdl file, the actual service calls fail 
to send a request (the tcp connection is created). As the same soap 
service can be accessed via http instead of https, AND http never fails, 
the problem seems to be creating a SSL context for some reason. When 
retrying, it works after about 10-15 seconds but fails immediately when 
retrying before that.

Because https is unrealiable, I have created a http<->https tunnel using 
stunnel and I have made SoapClient access using http via stunnel (that 
converts to/from https stream) to the webservice. Doing this is so far 
100% reliable (even without caching the wsdl file).

To me this clearly indicates that SoapClient has occasional problems 
with SSL (in php 5.2.9 on Solaris).

I'll create en rc-file to ensure stunnel is started when the OS boots 
and with that I have worked around the bug in SoapClient.

/Bernhard