Member Avatar for Ari5555

What is the latest recommended method for having multiple client desktop application pass information to a server application located across the internet?

I am using c# and Vis studio 2008, and not sure if SOAP is appropriate or maybe SOAP has been superseded by WCF.
Or maybe there are other methods that are more suitable.

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Short answer: pick the transport that matches your requirements (interop, latency, push, reliability) rather than a single “one-size-fits-all” stack. and were correct that older .NET options exist, but today the common, well-supported approaches are HTTP/REST, high-performance RPC, real-time persistent connections, or queued messaging — chosen by scenario.

If you need broad compatibility and simple request/response (CRUD, form submissions, easy debugging), a RESTful API over HTTPS is the safest path; it plays well with firewalls, browser tools, and mobile/desktop clients (ASP.NET Core Web API). For low-latency, strongly-typed RPC and streaming between C# clients and a .NET server, consider gRPC (gRPC for C#). For server-to-client push or interactive apps use a persistent channel (for example, SignalR for .NET) so the server can push updates without clients polling (SignalR). For decoupling, durability, and offline-tolerant workflows, introduce a message broker (RabbitMQ, cloud queuing) and design for idempotent message handling (RabbitMQ).

Operational cautions: clients behind NAT/firewalls should initiate outbound TLS connections; avoid requiring inbound sockets on clients. Protect every channel with TLS, authenticate/authorize requests (token-based/OAuth/JWT), add retries with exponential backoff, and make operations idempotent. Measure latency and throughput early; if JSON payloads become a bottleneck move to binary formats (for example, protobuf with gRPC).

Practical step path: start with a small HTTPS API, add telemetry and version your endpoints, then add a real-time layer or migrate hot paths to gRPC only where needed. If staying on legacy .NET Framework for now, plan the migration path for future cross-platform support.

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Member Avatar for privatevoid

I would look at WCF more closely it is based on SOAP and may be what you are looking for by the sounds of it.

See:
Microsoft What is WCF

Member Avatar for sknake

WCF is the "latest and greatest" but tou can also take a look at remoting. I am in the middle of a project with similar requirements and WCF scared me back in to remoting. I know microsoft is promoting WCF but I just haven't been able to find enough resources and support with the designer for all of the decorating WCF requires.

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