Every toolset evolves. Archaeological evidence validates the historic progression of and improvements in prehistoric hunting tools over hundreds and thousands of years. Metal ore and heat were combined in ways that gave tools the ability to withstand chipping, breaking or other types of damage. Over time, toolmakers engaged in problem definition, tool creation and improvement. Evolution is a constant.
There is a parallel with communication tools used in enterprises today. As work group managers, we are constantly seeking ways to overcome communication, workflow and process problems. Once we identify a problem we run to the IT staff — the “tools craftsman” of today — to help us solve it. We explain, “I need this data in [...]

“Well, the problem is that SOAP is hard.”
It’s early 2007 and I’m dead in the middle of a conversation with a friend at PayPal.
“We were certain that developers accessing the eBay product data would want everything in SOAP and it just made sense to do it that way. It wasn’t right, though. Turns out, SOAP is hard.”
This is neither the first nor the last time I’d find myself submerged in the ‘what-counts-as-too-hard for data access?’ conversation, or the ‘so-who-are-our-users-REALLY?’ conversation that’s never too far behind. Every year sees the addition of yet more developers working in yet more languages inside of even more frameworks than ever before. And the unspoken corollary [...]