Despite successful workarounds and inevitable solutions to Web services' shortcomings, it is relatively easy to convert an existing application into a Web service (Motorola's Redshaw can do it in three mouse clicks) - and if a CIO followed the advice of many vendors and gurus they would. But CIOs should err on the side of caution here. While on the surface Web services seems to do away with the need for middleware that connects applications and databases, that's not always the case. In fact, Redshaw says that the opposite is true: Web services (at this point, anyway) is just another layer that uses middleware to connect to the data. Building a lot of Web services could prove fatal to a company that doesn't have a middleware-intensive, three-tier architecture in place. Redshaw likens it to erecting a fabulous skyscraper that's not connected to the city's electric grid - you may have something great, but you can't use it.

Furthermore, Web services adds an extra layer of complexity that not all IT departments are in a position to handle. "When a program breaks, the hardware guy blames the application guy, the application guy blames the database guy," says Redshaw. "Now they can all blame the Web services layer." And building hundreds of Web services applications before installing an inventory system to keep track of them makes them impossible to reuse - which is the reason for building Web services in the first place.

What all this really means is that between building a middleware-intensive architecture, an organized Web services repository and conducting trials with some established business partners, CIOs should have enough work to tide them over until standards emerge. The future is coming.