XML-RPC is a Remote Procedure Call method that uses XML passed via HTTP as a transport. With it, a client can call methods with parameters on a remote server (the server is named by a URI) and get back structured data. This module supports writing XML-RPC client code; it handles all the details of translating between conformable Python objects and XML on the wire.

简单地，client可以调用server上提供的方法，然后得到执行的结果。类似与webservice。

推荐查看xmlprc的源文件：C:\Python31\Lib\xmlrpc

二、实例

1） Server

代码如下:

from xmlrpc.server import SimpleXMLRPCServer
from xmlrpc.server import SimpleXMLRPCRequestHandler

def div(x,y):
return x - y

class Math:
def _listMethods(self):
# this method must be present for system.listMethods
# to work
return ['add', 'pow']
def _methodHelp(self, method):
# this method must be present for system.methodHelp
# to work
if method == 'add':
return "add(2,3) => 5"
elif method == 'pow':
return "pow(x, y[, z]) => number"
else:
# By convention, return empty
# string if no help is available
return ""
def _dispatch(self, method, params):
if method == 'pow':
return pow(*params)
elif method == 'add':
return params[0] + params[1]
else:
raise 'bad method'

server = SimpleXMLRPCServer(("localhost", 8000))
server.register_introspection_functions()
server.register_function(div,"div")
server.register_function(lambda x,y: x*y, 'multiply')
server.register_instance(Math())
server.serve_forever()

2）client

代码如下:

import xmlrpc.client

s = xmlrpc.client.ServerProxy('http://localhost:8000')

print(s.system.listMethods())

print(s.pow(2,3)) # Returns 28
print(s.add(2,3)) # Returns 5
print(s.div(3,2)) # Returns 1
print(s.multiply(4,5)) # Returns 20

3）result