How do you programmatically get through a firewall to a SOAP server from a remote client?

Question

I have been looking at posts discussing SSH tunneling which sounds analogous to what I want to accomplish. However, we are programming in Java and have a remote SOAP server behind a firewall. The server is running under Linux but the rest of the network might be either Linux or Windows, or anything else for that matter.

Answer 1

we (...) have a remote SOAP server behind a firewall

If you are supposed to be able to access it, then the logic would be that the firewall should be configured to allow incoming requests using the transport mechanism you're using. If it doesn't, contact the network admins.

Answer 2

Simply put, you don't.

Your options are either to open a port in the firewall or to tunnel over a permitted port. There are packages like the one I like that will tunnel your data over a permitted protocol.

http://www.jcraft.com/jhttptunnel/

This one allows you to tunnel over HTTP, but you've got to be running it at both ends.