Over the years, our computing lifestyles have changed. Today, everyone sees the value of<br>the Internet, and our computing lifestyle is becoming more and more dependent on Webbased<br>services. Personally, I love to shop, get traffic conditions, compare products, buy<br>tickets, and read product reviews all via the Internet.<br>However, I’m finding that there are still many things I’d like to do using the Internet that aren’t<br>possible today. For example, I’d like to find restaurants in my area that serve a particular<br>cuisine. Furthermore, I’d like to be able to ask if the restaurant has any seating for, say, 7:00<br>p.m. that night. Or if I had my own business, I might like to know which vendor has a<br>particular item in stock. If multiple vendors can supply me with the item, I’d like to be able to<br>find out which vendor offers the least expensive price for the item or maybe which vendor<br>can deliver the item to me the fastest.<br>Services like these don’t exist today for two main reasons. The first reason is that no<br>standards are in place for integrating all this information. After all, vendors today each have<br>their own way of describing what they sell. The emerging standard for describing all types of<br>information is Extensible Markup Language (XML). The second reason these services don’t<br>exist today is the complexity of developing the code necessary to integrate such services.<br>Microsoft has a vision in which selling services is the way of the future—that is, companies<br>will offer services and interested users can consume these services. Many services will be<br>free; others will be available through a subscription plan, and still others will be charged per<br>use. You can think of these services as the execution of some business logic. Here are<br>some examples of services:<br>§ Validating a credit card purchase<br>§ Getting directions from point A to point B<br>§ Viewing a restaurant’s menu<br>§ Booking a flight on an airline, a hotel room, or a rental car<br>§ Updating photos in an online photo album<br>§ Merging your calendar and your children’s calendars to plan a family vacation<br>§ Paying a bill from a checking account<br>§ Tracking a package being shipped to you
