Microsoft on Tuesday took a stab at bolstering the Web-based tools and specifications needed to make Web services more secure, and more attractive to businesses.

At a developer's conference in Los Angeles, Microsoft also announced several new tools, and distributed near-final versions of its Visual Studio.Net and .Net Framework tools to conference attendees. Those tools are key to rallying developers around the company's .Net Web services plan. Microsoft faces competition from Sun Microsystems and companies including Oracle, IBM, and others supporting Java.

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