So by everything you've got,  I mean today I have unpacked the toolbox to try and resolve a design issue one of my clients is looking to resolve.

A large ERP system on SQL 2000 exposes lots of functionality as COM objects.    To further make this interesting the parameters for these COM calls, read values from temporary SQL tables.    The primary parameter to the COM calls is the name of the temporary table.

OK, first person that tells me what ERP system that is, gets a mention (best I can do)...

So here's the rub.   Customer would like a mobile solution that in realtime can communicate with the backend ERP.

Customer in question only has port 443 opened to that mobile devices can only communicate via an SSL connection.

So I'm thinking Web-Service that talks to the COM objects and database.     COM interop is fab in Visual Studio 2005 so this shouldn't be two much of an issue (and easier than rolling com calls into stored procedures).    + its very elegant to add web-references to a mobile app.

I think the only thing I will have to-do is add some transaction management stuff at the mobile end to ensure that my calls to the web-service always complete (mobile patterns and practices can help with that one).

It these kind of issues that keep it interesting and makes mobile applications a unique challenge.

Will keep you posted...