I wrote an article for the journal code4lib “Using a Web Services Architecture with Me, Myself and I” and I keep realizing all of the things it is missing. But that is what a blog is good for, right?

There is something that just feels right about creating three applications all working in concert to do the job of a single application: it feels a little bit messy, but good messy. It is not that the code is sloppy or carelessly composed. And while I wouldn’t necessarily go so far as to use cliches about the whole being greater than the sum of the parts, the messiness is what makes the application lifelike. In other words, it is like a library. It is as if each individual application comprises a different department making a contribution to the entire teaching and research mission of the library.

Part of this line of thinking is influenced by an excellent article my colleague Allan forwarded, “Design in the Age of Biology.” In it, the author discusses what he calls the rise of service design. He characterizes service in the following way:

Robert Lusch [14] wrote about changes in marketing, describing a service-dominant logic in which “value is defined by and co-created with the consumer rather than embedded in output.” The “make-and-sell” strategy of linear value chains gives way to the “sense-and-respond” strategy of self-reinforcing “value cycles.” Lusch described traditional goods-centered dominant logic as focused on “operand resources,” tangible assets with inherent value. He contrasted that logic with emerging service-centered dominant logic focused on “operant resources,” intangible assets, which create value in their use, such as skills, technologies, and knowledge.

In our case looking at the way in which our applications operate, the value is derived from continuing to further develop their service orientation. Their value is initially based on the service providing behavior: they expose data that is reused and repurposed by other applications. But now I am finding that there is a self reinforcing cycle that is beginning to emerge as we discover other ways to put that data to work.

Which is to say, these applications are beginning to take on a life of their own.

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