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Converting a WCF (svcutil) C# code into the corresponding SOAP envelope POST request

This is how I'm currently (and successfully) connecting to a WCF web service in C#. I do not have any control over this web service as it's not developed by me, so I cannot change it. Here is the C# code I use:
WSHttpBinding binding = new WSHttpBinding();
binding.Security.Mode = SecurityMode.TransportWithMessageCredential;
binding.Security.Message.ClientCredentialType = MessageCredentialType.UserName;
binding.Security.Message.NegotiateServiceCredential = true;
binding.Security.Message.AlgorithmSuite = System.ServiceModel.Security.SecurityAlgorithmSuite.Default;
binding.Security.Message.EstablishSecurityContext = true;
EndpointAddress endpoint = new EndpointAddress("<address>");
fooClient client = new fooClient(binding, endpoint);
client.ClientCredentials.UserName.UserName = "the_username";
client.ClientCredentials.UserName.Password = "the_password";
//fooClient class came from running
// svcutil.exe https://<thedomain>/foo/foo.svc?wsdl
//I now work with fooClient, call methods on it, etc.
I want to connect to the web service without C# - by manually creating a SOAP envelope and doing a POST request on the endpoint. I tried doing a POST request that looks like this:
POST /foo/foo.svc HTTP/1.1
Content-Type: application/soap+xml; charset=utf-8
Host: <thedomain>
Connection: close
User-Agent: <my user agent>
Content-Length: 416
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<soap12:Envelope xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:soap12="http://www.w3.org/2003/05/soap-envelope">
<soap12:Body>
<someWebServiceFunction xmlns="http://<thedomain>/foo/foo">
<someParameter>some parameter value</someParameter>
</someWebServiceFunction>
</soap12:Body>
</soap12:Envelope>
But this does not work because the credentials are missing. (I get an error back: "BadContextToken", "The security context token is expired or is not valid. The message was not processed.")
My question is, how do I add credentials to my SOAP envelope / HTTP request? I tried doing plain HTTP Basic Auth (in the Authorization HTTP header), but this continues to give me the same "BadContextToken" error.

There are two simple ways to trouble shoot your issue:
If you are using Visual Studio, in debug, send the request and intercept what is the detailed content in the request, and you can simulate it using plain HTTP POST.
If you can use SoapUI, you can target the service using SoapUI and send one working request, in the raw tab, you will see what's the accepted request with credentials.

C# Parsing Response of a Java Web Service

I am calling a Java WebLogic web service from my .Net application. I have added a service reference to the jws service.
The service can be called fine and I can see the response in Fiddler, however the problem is that the propery listOfHolds is coming as null although I can see a list of holds in the XML of the response.
Here is the code for calling
holdsList result = proxy.viewHoldsList(request.AccountNo);
int noOfHolds = result.NumberOfHolds; // This value is read fine
object[] holds = result.listOfHolds; // This is coming as Null despite the values in the response
Here is the response XML as captured by Fiddler
<?xml version='1.0' encoding='UTF-8'?>
<S:Envelope xmlns:S="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/">
<S:Header>
<work:WorkContext xmlns:work="http://oracle.com/weblogic/soap/workarea/">rO0...AAA</work:WorkContext>
</S:Header>
<S:Body>
<ns0:viewHoldsListResponse xmlns:ns0="http://www.openuri.org/">
<ns0:viewHoldsListResult>
<ns0:TotalAmount>130.0</ns0:TotalAmount>
<ns0:NumberOfHolds>4</ns0:NumberOfHolds>
<ns0:listOfHolds>
<ns0:item xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:type="ns0:holdDetails">
<ns0:xsiType>HoldDetails</ns0:xsiType>
<ns0:Amount>100.0</ns0:Amount>
<ns0:StartDate>2014-02-15T00:00:00.0</ns0:StartDate>
<ns0:ExpiryDate>2014-02-20T00:00:00.0</ns0:ExpiryDate>
<ns0:Description>For testing</ns0:Description>
<ns0:Instruction/>
<ns0:Tracer>00000810000287294002</ns0:Tracer>
<ns0:HoldId>3591376655</ns0:HoldId>
<ns0:EmployeeId>0</ns0:EmployeeId>
</ns0:item>
<ns0:item xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" xsi:type="ns0:holdDetails">
<ns0:xsiType>HoldDetails</ns0:xsiType>
<ns0:Amount>10.0</ns0:Amount>
<ns0:StartDate>2014-02-15T00:00:00.0</ns0:StartDate>
<ns0:ExpiryDate>2014-02-17T00:00:00.0</ns0:ExpiryDate>
<ns0:Description>DESC</ns0:Description>
<ns0:Instruction/>
<ns0:Tracer>00000810000287294004</ns0:Tracer>
<ns0:HoldId>3591376656</ns0:HoldId>
<ns0:EmployeeId>0</ns0:EmployeeId>
</ns0:item>
</ns0:listOfHolds>
</ns0:viewHoldsListResult>
</ns0:viewHoldsListResponse>
</S:Body>
</S:Envelope>
I have faced a similar problem before and the problem was a missing xmlns attribute on one of the tags. In this case I am suspecting the extra <ns0:xsiType>HoldDetails</ns0:xsiType> tag that is coming under the <ns0:item> tag.
Update Even after the web service provider removed the extra <xsiType> tag, I am unable to read the listOfHolds.
My questions are:
Can I do anything in my .Net code so that I get the intended value for listOfHolds?
Can I suggest any change to the owner of the Java web service?
[Optional] Why NumberOfHolds is being successfully read from the response but not listOfHolds?

The vendor of the web service has made a change. They changed xsi:type="ns0:holdDetails" to xsi:type="ns0:HoldDetails" (H instead of h).
The point is in Java, and unlike .Net as far as I can tell, they have a control over the generated XML from the web service.

WebClient call to a WCF Data Service is dropping the specific exception message

I have a WCF Data Service with a ServiceOperation on it that is being called via WebClient (the ServiceOperation returns non-entity data, so I have to parse the XML result from the WebClient). The code to make the call looks like this (I've removed some sensitive info from the code):
WebClient wc = new WebClient();
string requestXMLresult = wc.DownloadString(new Uri(string.Format("http://localhost:49370/DataService.svc/ServiceOperationName?<params, etc>")));
XDocument xdoc = XDocument.Parse(requestXMLresult);
// <etc>
During (for example) authentication, my service can throw a DataServiceException like this:
throw new DataServiceException(401, "The specified user did not have permissions to any resources.");
The problem is, on the client end, when that exception comes back I lose the extra text on the exception. The actual exception I get says "(401) Unauthorized", and that's it. I have checked the InnerException, exception messages, etc, and it seems to be lost.
Is there a way to preserve that message across a WebClient connection? I am not sure if this is a WCF Data Service problem, or a problem in general with exceptions thrown across WebClient connections (I suspect the latter, but I'm pretty new at this).
Any help is much appreciated!

I don't think you can do that, because a 401 is a standard HTTP error code with a standard message.
If you return a 200 with your own text, that might work, but any of the 4* or 5* codes would just stick to the standard messages.

.Net - Consuming webservice without WSDL

We have a new accounting system that provides webservice interface to external clients. I want to access one of the interfaces but there's no WSDL so i created the request through the use of HttpWebRequest and it works fine.
However to ease the creation of the requests and parsing of the response i would like to create some kind of automapping function. I have the request and response structure in an XSD file. Any ideas?
Request creation:
public void SendRequest()
{
HttpWebRequest request = CreateWebRequest();
XmlDocument soapEnvelopeXml = new XmlDocument();
soapEnvelopeXml.LoadXml(#"<?xml version=""1.0"" encoding=""utf-8""?>
<soap:Envelope xmlns:soap=""http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/"">
<soap:Body xmlns:xsi=""http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance"" xmlns:xsd=""http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"">
++ structure type inserted here ++
</soap:Body>
</soap:Envelope>");
using (Stream stream = request.GetRequestStream())
{
soapEnvelopeXml.Save(stream);
}
using (WebResponse response = request.GetResponse())
{
using (StreamReader rd = new StreamReader(response.GetResponseStream()))
{
string soapResult = rd.ReadToEnd();
Console.WriteLine(soapResult);
}
}
}

Well, if you really have no way of getting hold of a proper WSDL file but have XSD:s you could probably use the xsd.exe tool to create classes that map to your request and response types.
Something like this (run this in a Visual Studio Command Prompt)
xsd.exe TheRequest.xsd /c /n:Your.Namespace
xsd.exe TheResponse.xsd /c /n:Your.Namespace
But really, try your best to find that WSDL, it will make your life a lot easier..

I recommend that you Create a WSDL - reverse engineer it, and then produce your webservices client stubs from it.
The way to do it:
Get a wire trace of the exact request and response the webservice uses. Use Fiddler or something similar.
Build a WCF service, that approximates the request and response.
Get the trace of that
Compare (3) to (1). Remember you want XML infoset equivalence. Your namespace prefixes need not be the same, for example. Your namespaces need not be declared in the same location. But, the element names need to be exactly the same, and the xmlns strings need to be exactly the same. Modify the WCF service to more closely match the original. Restart it, go to step 3. Iterate as many times as it takes.
point your WCF client to the real web service
sit back and relax.
I've done this and it works. It can be tricky if you don't have insight into how DataContract attributes affect the XML on the wire. But as you play with it, you will gain the insight pretty quickly.
But how is it possible that it is a SOAP service and there is no WSDL on the service side? It might save you a ton of work to re-double your efforts to locate the real WSDL.

how to read http response soap headers from web service response in proxy class

I'm having some problems with one webservice that i'm working with. I generated a proxy class with wsdl.exe that comes with .net framework. But that webservice return a header that isnt not mapped by the wsdl. I must map the header sop because it contains some properties that i have to read and work with. how can i read the soap's header collection?
Ex.:
<soap:Envelope xmlns:soap="http://schemas.xmlsoap.org/soap/envelope/">
<soap:Header xmlns="http://xml.amadeus.com/ws/2009/01/WBS_Session-2.0.xsd">
<Session>
<SessionId>545784545</SessionId>
<SequenceNumber>1</SequenceNumber>
<SecurityToken>asd7a87sda89sd45as4d5a4</SecurityToken>
</Session>
</soap:Header>
<soap:Body>
<TAM_Altea_Seguranca_AutenticarRS xmlns="http://xml.amadeus.com/2009/04/TAM/TAM_Altea_Seguranca_AutenticarRS_2.0">
<statusDoProcesso>
<codigoDoStatus>P</codigoDoStatus>
</statusDoProcesso>
</TAM_Altea_Seguranca_AutenticarRS>
</soap:Body>
</soap:Envelope>
I need to read the SOAP:HEADER -> Session.

Have you tried this?
source: Handle SOAP Headers Required by an XML Web Service Client
public class MyWebService
{
public SoapUnknownHeader[] unknownHeaders;
[WebMethod]
[SoapHeader("unknownHeaders")]
public string MyWebMethod()
{
foreach (SoapUnknownHeader header in unknownHeaders)
{
// process headers
}
// handle request
}
}

See this page for detailed instructions on defining custom SOAP headers. There only seem to be VB.net code examples, but it should be easy enough to translate the principles in C#.