Academia gets creative with Web services

Academia gets creative with Web services | CNET News.com: "A Web service can help you catch a bus. Or test an electronic circuit from a dorm room. Or even take English writing tests in a new way.

The ideas for tracking bus locations or performing technical experiments over the Web came out of a joint research program between Microsoft and MIT. The goal of the initiative, called iCampus, is to improve the quality of campus life through technology. Although the five-year, $25 million program has been in place since 1999, the broad industry support of Web services standards over the past two years is giving professors and students the means to unlock access to hitherto hard-to-access information--and change the learning experience in the process."