Designing and Building TerraService

A few simple rules guide the design of Web services such as TerraService, a geospatial service added to Microsoft's popular TerraServer database. By sticking to standards-based tools, the authors were able to implement the Web service with no major structural changes to the database. Because it conforms to the "1-to-10 Kbytes in one second" guideline, TerraService offers a highly acceptable user experience. The success of two US Department of Agriculture applications that bridge the Web service and the database demonstrates the astuteness of the authors' design principles.