An Example Web Service

As a quick example, we can use a site that we will be interacting with later in the chapter using PHP, but for now, let's see what happens when you browse to https://packt.live/33iQi0M. This is a simple web service that receives the request from the client, reads the public IP address of the network that the request is coming from, and sends a response containing that IP address back to the client in a format that computers and humans can both easily read. Here is a screenshot of what you would see in your browser; however, note that the IP address would be different because it is dependent on your actual location:

Figure 10.1: Printing the IP address

This is a very simple service, but it illustrates the concepts we are trying to learn without the need for very complicated business logic. When you enter the preceding URL into your browser, you should see some curly braces, colons, and double quotes formatted around some text. The...