Notes/Domino Saves You Money - Part II: Web Services

Yesterday I announced that I'd been working on compiling a list of ways Notes/Domino can save your company money during this economic slowdown.

The first item on the list of how Notes/Domino can save your company money is Web Services. Connecting your Notes applications to other systems makes both of the connected systems exponentially more valuable. Since you already have Notes in place, why not connect your Notes applications to your enterprise data through a web service? With a little understanding of http and XML, the fact that many modern software applications offer web services as an interface makes this approach very cost effective.

Furthermore, mobile smart phones have become so prevalent, why not connect your Notes applications to them through web services? I've connected a Notes contact management database to a basic Blackberry application I wrote. Both the web service - essentially, a LotusScript agent - and the Blackberry application were fairly straight forward projects to build.

Let me know your thoughts on ways web services in Notes can help boost productivity, leverage resources, and cut expenses in your organization.