Emerging Web Technologies and Standards

"There will be no future versions of HTML. Instead XML and its applications have come to the forefront"

The web and Internet is not the same today as it was 3 years ago. It will not be the same in 3 years time. To work successfully in the area of Web Design and Development you need to realise that the field you are working in is constantly evolving. That means that unlike many other professions you will need to be constantly learning and adapting to new technology and trends. For example HTML is on the way out but XML and XHTML and CSS is in and becoming the way of the future for page development. That is just one small example. To be effective in Web you need to understand these new directions and be ready to ride the wave of change before it passes you by.

Web Standards and Protocols

The web has standards. If it didn’t then nothing would work. How could you communicate across browsers and different platforms and systems if there were no standards? Standards are critical to the survival and success of the Internet. There are a number of organisations that control or direct the standards for the web. 

1.	The World Wide Web consortium is the main body in the world for managing the standards of the web. The W3c was created in 1994 and it looks at creating guidelines and standards for the web to run on. It is made up of about 500 different member organisations and Tim Berners-Lee is the director (time is the guy who invented the Web in 1989).
Visit http://www.w3.org/ and check out some of the many areas that the W3c looks after. What is the Web Accessibility Initiative about?
The Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) develops strategies, guidelines, and resources to help make the Web accessible to people with disabilities.	

RFC n. Acronym for Request for Comments. A document in which a standard, a protocol, or other information pertaining to the operation of the Internet is published. The RFC is actually issued, under the control of the IAB, after discussion and serves as the standard. RFCs can be obtained from sources such as InterNIC. from Microsoft Computer Dictionary, Fourth Edition by Microsoft Corporation Microsoft Press © 1999

2.	The Web Standards Project is another body focused on establishing standards for the Web. The URL is http://www.webstandards.org
Visit their site and look at what they are about. What are some of the web issues they are dealing with in "Recent Buzz"? Do they have info on the SVG standard? 
Recent Buzz is CSS Hacks, Opera 9, Acid2, Web Forms 2.0, XAML, SXSW, IE7 Revealed and someone’s complaints about Disney’s UK Store website going backwards.	
YES, http://www.w3.org/TR/SVG/ has more info.  This specification defines the features and syntax for Scalable Vector Graphics (SVG) Version 1.1, a modularized language for describing two-dimensional vector and mixed vector/raster graphics in XML.	

3.	ECMA or European Computer Manufacturers Association is another standards body. Look at http://www.ecma-international.org/publications/standards/Ecma-348.htm to see their latest standard for WSDL (Web Services Description Language) which is XML based yet again.
What is WSDL for: -
Web Services Description Language (WSDL) is an XML schema for describing Web services and how they can be accessed by Web based Computer Supported Telecommunications Applications (CSTA) applications. Everything that an application needs to communicate with a Web service is described in a WSDL document.	

Some Emerging Technologies: -
SVG (Scalable Vector Graphics)
SVG is one of the new technologies of the web.
SVG has been called the "Flash Killer" because of its potential for the future of graphics on the web. It transcends the boundaries of resolution and is fully scalable. It is an application of XML and using markup it creates graphic images, animations and interactive graphics for the web. SVG requires a plug-in for browsers to support the technology but maybe in future browser releases the plug-in will be incorporated as it now is with the Flash plug-in in IE6.0.
Visit http://www.adobe.com/svg/ where you will find details of SVG in the SVG Overview link. You can also download the SVG Viewer 3.0 plug-in for your browser so you can see SVG graphics. Check out the SVG Tools and also look at SVG in action. The Chart tool allows you to build SVG charts online. Its not that long ago that Flash (and .swf) was this funny new file format that required a plug-in so you could view it. 
For downloading the SVG Plug-in viewer from Adobe the following is a link http://www.adobe.com/svg/viewer/install/auto/

Go to http://www.dbxgeomatics.com/SVG-XML.asp for a list of details of the advantages of SVG over traditional web graphics. What benefits does text in SVG graphics have when it comes to search engine indexes?
SVG offers a number of important advantages over bitmap or raster formats such as GIF and JPEG, especially when it comes to displaying drawn or mapping graphics. The advantages include:
•	Zooming. Users can magnify their view of an image without sacrificing sharpness, detail, or clarity. 
•	Text stays text. Text in SVG images remains editable and searchable. There are no font limitations and users will always see the image the same way you do. 
•	Small file size. SVG files are, on average, smaller than other web-graphic formats such as JPEG and GIF and are quick to download. 
•	Display Independence. SVG images are always crisp on screen and print out at the resolution of your printer, whether it’s 300 dpi, 600 dpi, or higher. You will never experience ugly, "jaggy" bitmaps. 
•	Superior color control. SVG offers a palette of 16 million colors, support for ICC color profiles, sRGB, gradients, and masking. 
•	Interactivity and intelligence. Since SVG is XML-based, it offers unparalleled dynamic interactivity. SVG images can respond to user actions with highlighting, tool tips, special effects, animation, and even real-time changes to surrounding HTML text.
	
As a text-based format, text within SVG images can be indexed by search engines or searched within a browser by users.	

Check out http://www.w3.org/Graphics/SVG/. What's the connection between SVG and mobile phones?
3 new phones from Nokia have just been announced. The three new phones, E60, E61 and E70, are the first models of the new business-oriented "E" series. All models are running Series 60 Edition 3, the latest evolution of the Series 60 platform, which packs support SVG Tiny 1.1 as a built-in feature, primarily for customization of the phone's user interface.	

Here is some more info on SVG taken from SVG Programming by Kurt Cagle Apress © 2002

"A Short History of XML and SVG
XML has sprung into existence seemingly overnight, but this appearance is deceptive. XML has, much like the Internet, gestated under a number of different forms since the late 1960s. During that decade, Charles Goldfarb, Edward Mosher, and Raymond Lorie of IBM faced a conundrum: how to effectively store electronic documentation. The solution they came up with soon came to be known as General Markup Language (GML), which was a way of providing a logically cohesive structure to a document that could in turn provide metadata about that document.
GML proved to be something of a hit in the early 1970s, and others began to provide their own implementations of GML. Unfortunately, although there was a great deal of similarity between these various markup languages, there were also a sufficient number of differences to make building tools for GML next to impossible. As a consequence, the adopters of this technology agreed to create a standard, called Standardized Generalized Markup Language (SGML), which was adopted by the United Nations (through the International Standards Organization) as a key standard for markup languages worldwide in the early 1980s.
SGML was an extremely powerful way of expressing a wide range of documents, but the growth and fracturing of SGML meant that the standard was also so sufficiently complex that it was difficult to implement on any but the largest machines. SGML consequently went into a decline after becoming a standard; it was still widely used but with far less activity going toward improving it during the period of intense growth in the computer industry between 1980 and 1992.
Examining PostScript
Another standard emerged in that same interval, however: PostScript. This language is a page-description language, or a theoretically human-readable standard for describing graphical content, including both pictures and the letters of words. Adobe Systems created PostScript in the early 1980s as a way for printers to universally describe how a page looked, and it was such a success that PostScript-based printers currently dominate the printer market.
It's worth examining PostScript in some detail because PostScript provided an interesting paradigm that has made its way into SVG: the use of plain text to describe graphical information."

SMIL (Synchronized Multimedia Integration Language)

SMIL integrates media using XML. It allows you to:-
o	Place multimedia elements in position
o	Synchronize the multimedia elements so that you can determine when audio, video and text will play.
o	Customize the playback of media for site visitor's preferences.
Yes it requires plug-in support. Try: -
http://kubrick.colorado.edu:6060/ramgen/beckoff/Bekoff.smi and you may need Apple Quick Time or Real Network player to view it.

Here is an excerpt from "Creating Web Based Training: A Step-by-Step Guide to Designing Effective E-Learning" by Joseph T. Sinclair, Lani W. Sinclair and Joseph G. Lansing AMACOM © 2002
Simultaneous Multimedia Integration Language (SMIL, pronounced "smile") puts a timeline in the Web. It's a Web standard. To see a SMIL presentation, students must use the RealPlayer. It plays SMIL either in the RealPlayer window itself or in the Web page. For the purposes of this book we will assume the SMIL presentation plays in the Web page.
What does it mean to say SMIL puts a timeline in the Web? It means you can have a dynamic presentation instead of a static one. You can orchestrate media files (elements) to play at the same time or in sequence and in the same place on the screen or in various places. The media files can be anything from text to video.
An easy-to-understand example is a self-playing slide show. A student starts the slide show (e.g., by clicking on button), and each slide displays on the screen for a certain period after which another slide takes its place. The slide show could be set to music that plays continually while the slides make their appearances, or it could be coordinated with voice commentary.
Here is another excerpt on SMIL that looks at the syntax of the coding, from Streaming Media Bible by Steve Mack Hungry Minds © 2002: -

SMIL: An Overview
SMIL is a simple, XML-based markup language that enables multimedia authors to combine multiple data types into a single presentation. The language itself is simple and straightforward, consisting of tags in angle brackets, such as <smil>. This set of tags enables the author to define the layout of a presentation, as well as all the necessary timing information. Because SMIL is XML-compliant, it should look familiar to anyone who has ever examined HTML code.
SMIL presentations are divided into two sections. The first section is the header section, where the author defines the global characteristics of the presentation, such as width and height, as well as areas of the screen (regions) where different parts of the presentation should be displayed. Metadata can also be specified in the header section.
	Tip 	Metadata is information about a file, such as the title, author, and copyright of a file.	
The second section is the body, where all the timing information is specified. Clips can be played in sequence, one after the other, or in parallel, at the same time. Alternatively the author can specify exact begin and end times for each clip. The body section can also contain tags that specify which streams to send depending on the viewer's bandwidth, language preference, or player version. Listing 26-1 is a simple SMIL file that plays an audio file, which is followed by a video file.
Listing 26-1: A simple SMIL file 
<smil>
       <head>
       <root-layout width="320" height="240"/>
    </head>
      <body>
       <seq>
          <audio src="rtsp://my.server.com/audio.rm"/>
          <video src="rtsp://your.server.com/video.rm"/>
       </seq>
    </body>
   </smil>
All SMIL files must begin and end with the <smil></smil> tags. After the opening <smil> tag, the layout of the presentation is defined in the header section. The header section is enclosed with <head></head> tags, and contains a single line of code which defines the size of the presentation. In this case, the size of the presentation is 320 x 240. 
Following the header section is the body section, which is enclosed by the <body></body> tags. In this body section, two media streams are contained within <seq></seq> tags, which specifies that they are to be played in sequence. In this presentation, the audio.rm file on my.server.com is played, followed by the video.rm file on your.server.com.
The preceding example is not so revolutionary. In fact, you might be tempted to ask why eleven lines of code were necessary to play two simple files back to back when you could accomplish the same thing with two lines of code in a metafile. To answer this, take a look at a typical television program and break it down into its component parts.
Figure 26-1 is an artist's rendition of a typical sports program. It may look like any other television program, but a closer inspection reveals that it is a particularly information-rich presentation. The announcer talks about the day's sporting events. As he speaks, photos of the various stories are displayed over his shoulder. During the whole presentation, scores from various leagues are displayed along the bottom of the screen. Last but not least, the sports network's logo is displayed in the lower right hand corner — a persistent reminder of who owns the broadcast.

Figure 26-1: A typical sports television broadcast consists of different types of media. 
We see the program as a single presentation, but it actually consists of four separate elements:
•	Video: The announcer is a continuous video stream.
•	Changing images: Different photos are used to illustrate each story. 
•	Text: The sports scores along the bottom provide additional text information.
•	Persistent image: The logo in the lower right hand corner that never changes.
Before the television program can be broadcast, it must be assembled in the television studio from the individual parts. The four separate elements are produced individually and combined using powerful video broadcasting tools. The resulting video is sent to the television station's antenna or satellite and broadcast to the audience.
This modularity gives the program a large degree of flexibility. By separating the program into its component parts, different people can be assigned to different parts of the broadcast. A few simple keystrokes can change whether the images are displayed on the right or left. The scores along the bottom can be made to disappear if desired. The component parts can also be re-used. The sports scores could be used in the evening news, or the broadcast could be licensed to a third party with the logo in the lower right-hand corner removed.
SMIL mirrors this modularity in software. By allowing the author to specify multiple data types and different regions, a large degree of flexibility is provided. Streams can be combined and re-used, moved around in both time and space. This flexibility provides not only a large degree of freedom for the author, but more importantly, significant bandwidth savings, which enables the creation of rich multimedia presentations at low bandwidths

What are some benefits of using SMIL and what for?

SMIL is an easy-to-learn HTML-like language, and many SMIL presentations are written using a simple text-editor. SMIL is typically used for "rich media"/multimedia presentations which integrate streaming audio and video with images, text or any other media type. 	

SOAP (Simple Object Access Protocol)
SOAP used to be something you used to wash yourself, but guess what … it's yet another XML based language. 
Here is an excerpt on Web Services and SOAP from Web Services ReferencePoint Suite by SkillSoft © 2002

In the last few decades, technology has been growing consistently to match user requirements. A number of technologies provide varied solutions for equally varied business requirements.
After the slump in the dotcom industry and the economic slowdown, businesses are moving towards the integration of enterprise applications. The new Web applications are focusing on integrating applications running in different enterprises across distant geographical locations. To achieve interoperability between these applications, the concept of Web services was born. Web services enable you to use the Web mechanism employed by one or more applications to implement business logic.
However, the implementation of Web services poses a challenge. Many enterprises have implemented distributed applications to serve their custom business needs. Although these applications serve the needs of these enterprises well, such applications cannot be readily integrated because they might be running on different platforms and utilizing their own business logic in different languages.
Here, the need for a common technology that can be used across different platforms arises. As you will see later, Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP) is a protocol that enables you to achieve integration across enterprises. Business requirements for application integration can be effectively met by using SOAP.

What is SOAP
SOAP is an XML-based protocol that is used to access services, objects, and servers in a platform- and vendor- independent manner. Although SOAP can use a variety of other protocols, it generally uses Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTP) as the transport protocol.
SOAP is widely accepted because it is an XML-based protocol. SOAP enables business objects to communicate in a decentralized, distributed Web-based environment. DevelopMentor, Microsoft, and Userland Software developed the protocol as a joint effort to enable distributed applications to communicate over HTTP.
To establish communication between applications, SOAP defines specific rules, wraps the parameters from the methods at run time, and plugs the parameters into a well-defined XML document. The resulting document is transported to its destination through HTTP
SOAP
SOAP is a lightweight and non-wireless protocol that lets applications communicate in a distributed and decentralized environment. SOAP has the potential to operate with other standard protocols, such as HTTP, Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP), and so on. The specification defines a simple and extensible way of message processing.
Some of the advantages of SOAP over other protocols are listed below:
•	Unlike other protocols, which are binary protocols, SOAP is an XML-based protocol. Therefore, it is easy to create and debug SOAP messages.
•	SOAP can operate across systems that are protected by firewalls because SOAP generally uses HTTP, a firewall-friendly protocol, as its transport protocol.
	Note 	HTTP is considered a firewall-friendly protocol because most proxy servers are configured to allow data exchange by HTTP to enable Internet connectivity.	

Visit http://www.w3.org/TR/SOAP/ to find out more about SOAP. Try other searches on the web and explain what the SOAP protocol is used for and give examples if you can of its use.
SOAP is a simple XML-based protocol to let applications exchange information over HTTP. 
•	SOAP is a communication protocol 
•	SOAP is for communication between applications 
•	SOAP is a format for sending messages 
•	SOAP is designed to communicate via Internet 
•	SOAP is platform independent 
•	SOAP is language independent 
•	SOAP is based on XML 
•	SOAP is simple and extensible
•	SOAP allows you to get around firewalls
•	SOAP will be developed as a W3C standard	

Web Services
The following excerpt provides more info on the connection between SOAP, XML and Web Services from Web Services ReferencePoint Suite by SkillSoft © 2002.
Web Services and SOAP — A Joint Venture
Web services were conceptualized when it became essential for enterprises running on disparate systems to provide an integrated solution for enhanced business productivity and customer satisfaction. Here is a short scenario that highlights the importance of Web services.
Consider two enterprises that are using Linux and Windows operating systems each. One of the enterprise hosts a Web site that allows customers to place orders for computers. These computers are manufactured by the second enterprise. The Web site hosted by the first enterprise needs to query the catalog of the second enterprise to ensure that the required quantity is available.
Therefore, you need to devise a mechanism by which the two enterprises, running different systems, can share data in real time. Such a mechanism can be easily implemented by XML-based Web services. By implementing XML-based Web services, you can create Web methods that allow a Web service client to connect to the Web service and retrieve the quantity of one or more brands of computers available in the inventory. This Web service and the Web service client communicate by using SOAP messages.
From the above discussion, the following advantages of Web services can be interpreted:
•	Web services are operating system-independent as long as the operating system on which a Web service is created supports the SOAP protocol and XML and the Web service itself implements the protocol.
•	When a Web service is upgraded, the benefits of the upgraded Web service are immediately available to the Web service clients. This is because the methods and properties of the Web service are invoked remotely from the Web service client and every time these methods are updated, the changes are available immediately.
To enable Web service clients to utilize a Web service, a discovery document is required. The discovery document enables a Web service client to discover and call the methods exposed by a Web service. The discovery document is written in Web Services Description Language (WSDL).

What are Web Services and what are they used for: -
Web Services is an umbrella term used to describe components and services that are addressable and available using web technology. The kinds of web services are typically user-oriented and browser-based, API-accessible, or system services functionality. A web service could be a browser-based e-mail program, an XML-based interface to an HR system, a SOAP service offered by a machine, a SOAP monitoring service, XML-based integration with an EAI or legacy system, and so on. The standards for the way components in a web service exchange data is crucial. Some of the infrastructure standards that are being created include SOAP, WSDL, UDDI, SAML, ebXML, as well as many vertical standards being created as well. 
There are at least three common web service deployment types. 
In the first place, one can add a web service interface onto an existing product; examples of this approach include application servers, databases, messaging systems, enterprise resource planning tools, and so on. Generally software vendors are taking this approach. 
In the second place, customers deploy vendor products to solve current integration needs. The customer then uses the new web services functionality to integrate internally or with external partners more easily. 
In the third place, an application service provider offers a web service interface, and its customers access and use the service using web service standards. An interesting difference between these deployment types is the different economic model they imply. Vendors gain make money from product sales; customers gain a return on their investment from increased efficiency and expanded customer revenue; and application service providers make money from recurring or rental revenue of the web service itself. 

The UDDI Initiative
What is the UDDI Initiative all about? Look at http://www.uddi.org/about.html to learn about the Universal Description, Discovery and Integration (UDDI) protocol. See also the info on the next page (page 9).
UDDI is an industry-wide, accepted approach for businesses to reach their customers and partners with information about their products and Web services. 
Problems the UDDI specification can help to solve: 
1.	Making it possible for organizations to quickly discover the right business from millions currently online
2.	Defining how to enable commerce to be conducted once the preferred business is discovered
Immediate benefits of the UDDI project for businesses include: 
1.	Reaching new customers
2.	Expanding offerings
3.	Extending market reach
4.	Increasing access to current customers
5.	Solving customer-driven need to remove barriers to allow for rapid participation in the global Internet economy
6.	Describing their services and business processes programmatically in a single, open, and secure environment
7.	Using a set of protocols that enable businesses to invoke services over the Internet to provide additional value to their preferred customers.

The following is an excerpt from a book named "XML Web Services Professional Projects" by Arora and Kishore.
Defining UDDI
UDDI, initiated by Ariba, IBM, and Microsoft, is an industry standard for registering, publishing, and discovering Web services in a central registry called the UDDI directory. Since the time that the UDDI initiative started, UDDI has grown to more than 300 organizations that work in coordination to develop the UDDI specifications. UDDI is an attempt to encourage interoperability and adoption of Web services.
A UDDI directory is a platform-independent framework that allows you to publish information about a Web service. This information includes the description of the Web service, Web methods that are included in the Web service, the procedure that a client application needs to follow to communicate with the Web service, and a programmer's interface that allows users to interact with the UDDI directory.
For example, perhaps you want to create a B2B solution for an online departmental store. This involves creating the components, such as a database and an interface, in the form of Web pages that are used to interact with users. In addition, you need to provide the users with a catalog of goods sold at the departmental store. The catalog picks up the data from the database.
The Web site also includes a user authentication page that validates the username and the password. The information is validated based on the user's data in the database. When a user places an order for an item on the Web site, the credit card details need to be validated. This common scenario is applicable to almost all Web sites.
As you know, using Web services allows service providers to expose functionality on the Web that application developers can use on any platform. However, when you need functionality, you must search for a service provider. Searching for Web services in the UDDI directory is similar to searching for information in any search engine, such as Google or Yahoo. You simply need to perform a search based on keywords, and the matching results are returned to you.
The information in the UDDI directory is exposed to the users through a Web site. This Web site consists of a group of Web-based registries called the UDDI business registries. Several operator sites execute and manage the UDDI business registries. Anyone who needs to access the information about Web services or other business entities can log on to these registries. In addition, you can make information about your Web service available to other users in the UDDI business registries. An example of such a Web-based registry is http://uddi.microsoft.com. It is an official UDDI Web site by Microsoft that allows you to search for business entities based on several search criteria. These search criteria includes business name, business location, business identifiers, discovery URLs, and so on. 

Visit http://uddi.microsoft.com and describe the features and services offered here: What is the website for: -
New Features and Improvements
Developers can quickly find and reuse the Web services available within the organization. IT administrators can catalog and manage the programmable resources in their network. With UDDI Services, companies can build and deploy smarter, more reliable applications.	
Feature	Description	
Enterprise UDDI Services	Built as a managed code service in Windows Server 2003, Enterprise UDDI Services was developed using Microsoft ASP.NET and the Microsoft .NET Framework. It is a standards-based technology that takes advantage of Microsoft's own experience in running the Microsoft public node of the UDDI Business Registry (UBR). UDDI Services can be accessed through a Web-based user interface or programmatically through a SOAP interface.
Because UDDI Services automatically publishes its existence and location, it is easily discoverable as a Web service. UDDI Services is available in Windows Server 2003, Standard Edition, Enterprise Edition, and Datacenter Edition.	
Active Directory Integration	UDDI Services takes advantage of many features in the Active Directory® service. Active Directory provides the authentication and authorization backbone for UDDI Services. All access and permissions to UDDI Services, whether for reading, publishing, or coordination are assigned through a set of roles defined during installation within Active Directory. Furthermore, Active Directory provides one of the means for finding servers on the network that run UDDI Services. In addition, UDDI Services can optionally be installed as a service within Active Directory, enabling IT administrators, users, or applications to perform a simple query to obtain a list of all UDDI Services on the network.	
UDDI Application Programming Interface (API) and Web-based User Interface	UDDI Services supports programmatic inquiries through the UDDI API and also includes a Web interface with searching, publishing, and coordination features that are compatible with Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0 or later and Netscape Navigator 4.5 or later. UDDI Services supports versions 1.0 and 2.0 of the UDDI Programmer's API, enabling enterprise developers to publish, discover, share, and interact with Web services directly through their development tools and business applications.	
Searching and Publication	Authorized users can query UDDI Services and publish entries using the Web-based user interface or the UDDI API.	
Coordinator Role	Microsoft has added the coordinator role to provide enhanced administrative capabilities.	
Categorization Scheme Management	The Related Category API allows developers to programmatically traverse categorization schemes.	
Industry-leading Tools	Microsoft offers UDDI client support through several tools including Visual Studio .NET, the Office XP Web Services Toolkit, and the UDDI software development kit (SDK). Visual Studio .NET provides native support for UDDI Services through the command "Add Web Reference" enabling developers to easily discover Web services and other programmatic resources in UDDI for use in building applications.	
Data Import	A UDDI Services coordinator can import UDDI data from an XML file that complies with a defined schema.	
Authentication	UDDI Services supports native UDDI authentication and native Windows authentication.	
Roles Administration	IT administrators can easily manage access to UDDI Services functions—such as searching and publishing information—by assigning users to one of four roles: user, publisher, coordinator, and administrator.	
Microsoft Management Console (MMC) Administration Utility	UDDI Services site administrators can easily configure and remotely administer the UDDI Services server by using the Microsoft Management Console (MMC) utility. Site administrators can backup and restore the UDDI Services database.	
Database and Server Configuration	UDDI Services uses the Microsoft Data Engine as the default store. For high reliability and availability scenarios, UDDI Services can use Microsoft SQL Server™ 2000. UDDI Services may be deployed on a single server or across multiple servers. For example, IT administrators could distribute the Web-based user interface and APIs across one or more servers in a typical Web farm configuration and run the database on a separate dedicated server running SQL Server 2000. Or IT administrators could run the database on a clustered instance of SQL Server 2000 using Microsoft's clustering technology—a configuration that provides great scalability and reliability.	
Activity Monitoring	Windows Server 2003 provides the ability to audit all authenticated activities performed and the user that performed them.	

Benefits
UDDI Services delivers strategic benefits to companies deploying Web services. As a core piece of Web services infrastructure in Windows Server 2003, UDDI Services makes it easy to discover, share, and reuse Web services and other programmable resources. This can improve developer and IT productivity, resulting in lower total cost of ownership (TCO) and more reliable and manageable applications. These benefits enable:
	
Benefit	Description	
Greater Productivity	UDDI Services stores both the technical information to build an application compatible with a Web services interface, as well as the information required to successfully bind to that interface at runtime.
UDDI Services provides developers with a mechanism to find each other's services using a set of standard or customized classifications, which encourages code reuse.
With Web services, enterprise developers can share and reuse code regardless of their development platform.
Integrated with Microsoft Visual Studio® .NET and the Microsoft Office Web Services Toolkit, UDDI Services makes it easy for developers to locate and reuse Web services within their application development environment.Developers can easily discover, share, and reuse Web services when building applications or extending existing enterprise applications. A central repository of service description and technical binding information eases the task of reusing existing services and publishing new services based on standard- and custom-categorization schemes. With Web services, developers can reuse components regardless of their development platform.	
Greater Manageability	UDDI Services provides an efficient way to categorize programmable resources on the network. IT administrators can configure applications based on classifications schemes such as QoS, location, or organization during service deployment. For applications that check UDDI for binding information, only an update to UDDI is required to point applications at new services.	
Smarter Applications	Using UDDI Services in applications, developers can query UDDI Services for service and binding information and dynamically adapt at runtime. This results in more robust and smarter applications that consistently deliver a more reliable experience for users.	
Some Other References

W3C
    http://www.w3.org/

Web Standards Project
     http://www.webstandards.org
ECMA
    http://www.ecma.ch/

IEEE
    http://www.ieee.org/portal/index.jsp

IETF
    http://www.ietf.org/html.charters/wg-dir.html

What are web standards and how should I use them?
    http://archive.webstandards.org/edu_faq.html

Internet Protocols
    http://www.cisco.com/univercd/cc/td/doc/cisintwk/ito_doc/ip.htm

HTTP
    http://www.w3.org/Protocols/

HTTP made easy
    http://www.jmarshall.com/easy/http/

CGI made easy
    http://www.jmarshall.com/easy/cgi/

MIME Tutorial
    http://www.ufaq.org/navcom/mime_tutorial.html

SMTP
    http://raddist.rad.com/networks/1998/smtp/smtp.htm

SOAP
    http://www.w3.org/TR/SOAP/

SOAP FAQ
    http://www.develop.com/us/default.aspx 

UDDI
    http://www.uddi.org/

UDDI (Cover pages)
    http://www.oasis-open.org/cover/uddi.html

UDDI Browser
    http://www.soapclient.com/UDDISearch.htm

WSDL
    http://www.w3.org/TR/wsdl
Web Services Tutorial
    http://www.xml.com/pub/a/2001/04/04/webservices