The technology is viewed as an alternative to Apache Axis, a new release that came out this week.

Specifically, Version 1.1 of XFire, due in approximately three to four weeks, will support the WS-Security specification; MTOM (Message Transmission Optimization Mechanism) for handling large, binary objects; and JiBX, for XML object binding, said Dan Diephouse, developer and president of Envoisolutions,.

XFire, written two years ago, provides for Java-based Web services development. It has featured high performance, ease of use and integration with the Spring framework, Diephouse said. Pluggable bindings also have been a key attraction, he added.

"You can use anything to convert XML to objects, whether it be Castor, XMLBeans or JAXB (Java Architecture for XML Binding)," Diephouse said.

A conference attendee and XFire user touted the binding feature.