Roadmap to Microsoft Technologies for Microsoft Customer Relationship Management (CRM)

XML Web Services Developer Center Home provides developers with downloads, articles, newsgroup links, and more.

SOAP is a lightweight and simple XML-based protocol that is designed to exchange structured and typed information on the Web. The Soap Toolkit is available at this link as well as other valuable information.

Further discussion of SOAP and how to use it

Discussion of Web Services Description Language (WSDL) by Carlos C. Tapang. Begins with a summary of why you would want to use WSDL in conjunction with SOAP in a Web service. A sample WSDL file is reviewed to see its structure and how it works.

Extensible Markup Language (XML) is the universal format for data on the Web. This link will take you into the MSDN Library to review articles surrounding XML in addition to essential links and newsgroup information.

Use Visual C# .NET to create XML Web services and Microsoft® .NET-connected applications for Microsoft Windows® and the Web. This site includes a product overview, new features, links to developer Web sites, and more.

Learn about Visual Basic .NET in the MSDN Library. The Microsoft Visual Basic® development system is the most productive tool for creating high-performance components and applications. It offers developers the ability to create robust applications that reside on the client or server, or operate in a distributed n-tier environment.

The .NET Framework is the infrastructure for the overall .NET Platform. The common language runtime and class libraries (including Windows Forms, ADO.NET, and ASP.NET) combine to provide services and solutions that can be easily integrated within and across a variety of systems. This link will take you into the MSDN Library to review articles surrounding the .NET Framework, in addition to essential links and newsgroup information.

ASP.NET is a set of technologies in the Microsoft .NET Framework for building Web applications and XML Web services. This link will take you into the MSDN Library to review articles surrounding the ASP.NET, in addition to essential links and newsgroup information.

BizTalk Server 2002 makes it fundamentally easier to integrate your internal applications and securely connect with your business partners over the Internet. This link will take you into the MSDN Library to review articles surrounding the BizTalk Server, in addition to essential links and newsgroup information.

Microsoft SQL Server is a relational database management and analysis system for e-commerce, line-of-business, and data warehousing solutions. SQL Server® 2000, the latest version, includes support for XML and HTTP, performance and availability features to partition load and ensure uptime and advanced management and tuning functionality to automate routine tasks and lower total cost of ownership. This link will take you into the MSDN Library to review articles surrounding SQL Server, in addition to essential links and newsgroup information.

The Internet Information Services 5.1 Software Development Kit provides detailed information about creating ASP pages and developing Web applications. The section contains an Active Server Pages Guide and Programmer's Guide.

Active Directory is the directory service used in Microsoft Windows 2000 and is the foundation of Windows 2000 distributed networks. Active Directory provides secure, structured, hierarchical storage of information about the interesting objects in an enterprise network; such as users, computers, services, and so on. The directory provides rich support for locating and working with these objects. This page contains links to documents, sites, and sample code that will help the deployment, administration, and development of applications built upon Active Directory.

Microsoft Message Queuing (MSMQ) technology enables applications running at different times to communicate across heterogeneous networks and systems that may be temporarily offline. MSMQ provides guaranteed message delivery, efficient routing, security, and priority-based messaging. This link to the MSMQ home page provides an overview of MSMQ, white paper access, events, related products and technologies, and more.

Indexing Service is a base service for Microsoft Windows 2000 or later. Formerly known as Index Server, its original function was to index the content of Internet Information Services (IIS) Web servers. Indexing Service now creates indexed catalogs for the contents and properties of both file systems and virtual Webs. This link takes you into the Indexing Service SDK documentation in the MSDN Library.

The HTML Layout Control and the HTML Layout Editor

HTML Components (HTC). This link takes you directly to "Redistribute HTML Help Components" in the MSDN Library. For an overview of Microsoft HTML Help, go up one level to the section called "What is Microsoft HTML Help?" or to "Adding Help to Your Custom Application."

DHTML. This overview of Dynamic HTML (DHTML) in the MSDN Library includes an explanation of how to use DHTML; samples are included. DHTML is a set of innovative features in Microsoft Internet Explorer 4.0. By enabling authors to dynamically change the rendering and content of a document, DHTML gives authors the ability to create visually outstanding HTML documents that interact with the user, without the burden of relying on server-side programs or complicated sets of HTML pages to achieve special effects.

Microsoft JScript is an interpreted, object-based scripting language. Although it has fewer capabilities than full-fledged object-oriented languages like C++, JScript is more than sufficiently powerful for its intended purposes. JScript is the Microsoft implementation of the ECMA 262 language specification (ECMAScript Edition 3). With only a few minor exceptions (to maintain backwards compatibility), JScript is a full implementation of the ECMA standard. Resources available through this link into MSDN include the "JScript User's Guide," "Using JScript in Internet Explorer," and "JScript Language Reference."

Cascading Style Sheets. Web authors gain unprecedented control over the look of documents with Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). This link contains a list of articles that are available for CSS.

Microsoft Exchange Server is the messaging platform that provides e-mail, scheduling, online forms, and the tools for custom collaboration and messaging-service applications. The link takes you to the Exchange sections of MSDN Online that provides documentation, tools, and samples for easier and faster application development.

Microsoft Internet Explorer. This link to MSDN provides developers with the latest information about Internet technologies, including reference material, code samples, and in-depth articles on all aspects of Web site design and development. This page is the starting point for finding developer-oriented content on the following areas: Dynamic HTML, delivering content to the Web, component development, Internet tools and technologies, and component library.