<P>Now that's slick - SQL Server 2005 supports web services natively.&nbsp; There's an <A href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/sql/default.aspx?pull=/library/en-us/dnsql90/html/soapscenarios.asp">article on MSDN about it</A>.&nbsp; And they probably got most of it for free thanks to hosting the CLR.</P> <P>I've written a number of web services (probably most of the ones I've worked on actually) that basically come down to stored procedure calls.&nbsp; Retrieving data, storing data, updating data.&nbsp; </P> <P>Being able to do this with one less component is a very good idea.</P> <P>I don't agree with their decision to only support either encrypted or securely authenticated connections.&nbsp; It just means that if I really want an anonymous connection (and there are certainly good reasons to), I have to write&nbsp;my own web service to wrap it, or create an account and give out the credentials as part of my API documentation.&nbsp; The decision of whether or not to require more security should be in the hands of the administrator.</P> <P>&nbsp;</P>Thu, 01 Sep 2005 19:17:09 GMT