Cost is web services hero and villain

Web services technology still causes confusion among IT directors, with cost being seen both as a driver and a barrier to implementing it.

This was a finding of a new survey, carried out in four countries - the UK, Germany, Belgium and the Netherlands - which interviewed more than 300 IT directors in businesses including Shell, T-Mobile, Deutsche Bank and Birds Eye Walls.

The top benefits given for adopting web services were remote services and faster application development, but delegates at a roundtable debate said cost was the underlying reason for its adoption.

"If it isn't about reduced cost don't talk about web services," said Peter Bell of Microsoft's UK .Net and developer team. "People are making practical use of it today, predominantly for cost savings."

Cost was also the second most poular answer, behind security, to the question that asked what the main obstacles were that were preventing web services taking off.

Brian Reed, vice president of strategic planning at DataDirect Technologies, which commissioned the survey, said: "The cost issue highlights the need for education. One of the clear benefits of web services is its ability to reduce costs with easier integration and code re-use."

Regarding security, Bell noted that there was already a working implementation of the WS-Security draft specification. Others identified internal policies, trust and legal requirements as being as important as the technology itself.

All delegates agreed that web services technology was here for the long term. But they also argued that the term 'web services' needed changing.

"It's a huge catch-all term which means different things to different people," said Reed.

Among other findings, two thirds of companies have adopted web services in some form, with 55 per cent saying they had developed a web services strategy. Belgium led in both categories, while the Netherlands was by far the lowest-placed (33 per cent) in terms of strategy.

Tony Lock, analyst at Bloor Research, emphasised the importance of strategy. "Companies need to understand the capabilities," he said.

"'What does my business want to do? What are the limits to doing this?' Once you start working asynchronously [as web services requires], quality of service becomes very, very important."