Nusoap Laravel Package

Product Decisions This Supports

• Legacy System Modernization (with a stack prerequisite): Still the core value — integrate SOAP-based ERP/government/partner systems without rewriting core logic. But v0.10.0 sets a hard floor of PHP 8.2, so this now supports modernization only for products already on (or committed to) PHP 8.2+.
• Cost-Effective API Connectivity: No custom SOAP client needed. The release adds real test infrastructure (Nette Tester suites, E2E server tests, Codecov), which lowers the maintenance burden we absorb — the "buy" side of build-vs-buy gets stronger, not weaker.
• Compliance & Interoperability: SOAP 1.1/1.2 support remains, and the new configurable charencoding property (getter/setter) directly addresses a common integration defect class — legacy partners sending ISO-8859-1 or non-UTF-8 payloads. That's fewer "garbled characters in the invoice feed" tickets.
• Bidirectional Integration (new): The addition of E2E server tests confirms the SOAP server path is exercised, not just the client. This opens an option we previously didn't credit: exposing a SOAP endpoint to a partner that can't consume REST, without a separate stack.
• Roadmap Flexibility: Still supports gradual SOAP → REST/GraphQL migration by keeping legacy endpoints alive — but the PHP 8.2 floor should be sequenced against our PHP upgrade roadmap, not treated as free.
• Build vs. Buy: Skews further toward "buy." Active maintenance, CI matrix, static analysis config, and a deprecation-cleanup pass for PHP 8.5 are exactly the invisible costs we'd otherwise own.

When to Consider This Package

• SOAP Dependency: Your product or a partner requires SOAP (government APIs, legacy SaaS, EDI-adjacent systems).
• PHP 8.2–8.5 — now a requirement, not a range: v0.10.0 requires PHP >= 8.2. This is a breaking change versus the previously stated 5.6–8.5 support. Runtime support for 5.6–8.1 is effectively dropped (those versions are lint-only in CI, not tested).
• No usable ext-soap: The package's remaining differentiator is being pure PHP — valuable on shared hosting or containerized environments where the native soap extension is unavailable or disabled. If ext-soap is available, prefer it.
• Low-to-moderate complexity: WSDL-driven request/response work. The charset setter helps with encoding; still avoid if you need WS-Security, MTOM, or WS-Addressing.
• Avoid / re-plan if:
  • You are on PHP < 8.2 with no upgrade path this cycle — pin ^0.9 as a stopgap and set an explicit expiry date, or look elsewhere.
  • You can migrate to REST/GraphQL — still prioritize future-proofing.
  • You require hardened quality gates: the release explicitly allows PHPStan and CodeSniffer CI to fail, so "static analysis configured" is advisory, not enforced. Do not treat it as an assurance signal.
  • You're on PHP 8.6+ where the native extension likely suffices.

How to Pitch It (Stakeholders)

For Executives: "This package keeps us connected to [Partner X's ERP] and other SOAP-only systems without custom development. The new release is actively maintained — modern test suite, PHP 8.5 compatibility, encoding fixes that reduce integration defects. One decision it forces: it now requires PHP 8.2 or newer. If our PHP upgrade is already on the roadmap, this is a low-cost, low-risk dependency; if not, we need to either accelerate that upgrade or pin the previous version with a dated exit plan. Either way, no bespoke SOAP client to build or maintain."

For Engineering: *"v0.10.0 of the NuSOAP lineage (release published from contributte/nusoap — confirm and pin the exact Composer package name your app depends on) is a meaningful maintenance release with one breaking change:

• Breaking: composer.json modernized to require PHP >= 8.2. Tests and linter now target 8.2–8.5 only; PHP 5.6–8.1 is no longer a supported runtime. If we're below 8.2, stay on ^0.9 deliberately and track the upgrade.
• Feature: configurable charencoding with getter/setter — use it for partners on ISO-8859-1 or other legacy charsets instead of post-processing strings.
• Fixes: PHP 8.5 deprecations (curl_close(), non-canonical casts), PHP 8.2+ wsdl::$schemaTargetNamespace deprecation, undefined $tt_ns warning in serialize_val(), removed $HTTP_SERVER_VARS.
• Quality: real test suite (Nette/contributte tester), E2E server tests — so the server path is now credible, not just the client — plus Codecov and static analysis config.
• Caveat: PHPStan and CodeSniffer are configured to fail softly in CI. Treat static analysis as directional; our own review and tests remain the gate.
• Net: speed to integrate unchanged, reliability improved, and the version floor is now something we must schedule rather than assume."*

For Developers: *"Pin explicitly — this is a breaking release:

composer require contributte/nusoap:^0.10   # requires PHP >= 8.2
# or, if we're still below 8.2:
composer require <same-package>:^0.9

Usage is unchanged (new \nusoap_client($wsdl)). Set charencoding when a partner isn't UTF-8. Since the server path now has E2E coverage, it's fair game for exposing a SOAP endpoint if needed. Docs remain sparse — keep our own tests around namespaces, fault handling, and charset edge cases. Verify the fork/package name resolves to the maintained line before committing."*