Big Blue moves into the web services arena,

March 14, 2001 1:42 PM

Big Blue moves into the web services arena, claiming to be the first company to provide such services. Ever hear of .NET? Seems to me that they've been rolling a framework (that's got BETA development tools already) since last summer.

i think the most poignant point in this article isn't the fact that IBM's making false claims, but this quote by Peter O'Kelly:

``It's amazing that these guys are agreeing to work with the same standards. They've finally realized it's a disservice to customers when they try and compete on the basis of proprietary formats and protocols."

Now if the browser wars could end, we'd all be in better shape.
posted by tatochip (5 comments total)

Note the use of the weasel word deliver, right before the article acknowledges others have announced plans. I suppose that's true for various values of deliver, though you might be better off yet by declaring it generic web services, since there's obviously a raft of specialized services out there already.
posted by dhartung at 2:47 PM on March 14, 2001

Uh, services based on web applications that use a browser as the delivery vehicle have been around for a long time. It's only recently that Microsoft has jumped onto the bandwagon. Note that the entire Mozilla application platform has been in development since 1998 when Netscape released their source code. To give Microsoft or IBM or Netscape or Sun credit for being the first to deliver such services is just silly.
posted by camworld at 7:13 PM on March 14, 2001

In my experience this doesn't really mean all that much. I mean, sure IBM will get a bunch of clients eager to sign up. And then they'll give them the same crappy service that we already get for their Help Desk and other support services.
posted by igloo at 10:41 PM on March 14, 2001

uh camworld, i wasn't talking about web applications, but rather "web services," which is a completely and totally different concept altogether. it's a concept of shared applications which run across the net, communicating with one another via XML and SOAP technology.

it's the original idea behind the internet, from Berners-Lee himself.
posted by tatochip at 10:11 AM on March 15, 2001

tatochip: this is a nitpick, but "the internet" dates back to the 60's, and the original idea behind it predates Mr. Berners-Lee's arrival on the computing scene by some years. Perhaps it's "the Web" you mean?

-Mars
posted by Mars Saxman at 12:00 PM on March 15, 2001