The Pragmatic Craftsman :: Simplicity from complexity : by Stanley Kubasek ::

I found this to be an interesting and simple read about Web Services (from Application Develpment Trends magazine). You’ve probably heard about Web Services quite a few times and I think there is a lot of misunderstanding about it, hopefully this can give you a general idea about it and clear some things out.

What is a Web service?The simplest and most basic definition that I can give you is that a Web service is an application that provides a Web API. An API supports application-to-application communication. A Web API is an API that lets the applications communicate using XML and the Web.

So here’s the basic concept: Web services use the Web to perform application-to-application integration. A lot of the hype around Web services talks about dynamic assembly of Web-based software services. It talks about the software-as-a-service business model. It talks about spontaneous discovery of new business partners. My advice is to ignore this hype. It’s possible that at some point in the future some of these glossy images will become reality, but please don’t let the science fiction stories distract you from reality or dissuade you from using this technology today to solve real business issues.

Read more here (ADTmag.com).