Forum OpenACS Q&A: Response to Suggest where or how to research OpenACS vs. other Web systems

On the topic of loose coupling, it strikes me (the
non-programmer who's never afraid to shoot his mouth off about
things he doesn't fully understand) that maybe a syndication-like
approach might be worth considering. We have talked on these
boards about using SOAP or XML-RPC to provide OpenACS
functionality as a service. What difference does it make whether
that service is provided to another web site or a client on
somebody's desktop? If I understand Ben correctly, then the
point is basically to think encapsulation. If you can figure out how
to create an API for communication between your client thingie
and OpenACS, and if you can be reasonably comfortable that you
can make changes you might want to make to OpenACS or to
the client without breaking that API, then you should be OK.