I started lookin at the SQL Service Broker last night after reading John Lam's blog entry on the topic. This looks really cool as it provides guaranteed messaging between SQL Server Instances. I wouldn't be surprised if it goes beyond this scope, but that's what I'm looking for.
I performed this task on SQL 2000 and blogged about it back in July. My approach under SQL 2000 involved writing a c# cominterop object that took message data and posted it over a WebService call. The structure of the call was similar to the formatting of MSMQ messages. I wrote the logic to handle message failure and retries using T-SQL. The webservice along with the com object was packaged and installed on the SQL server boxes. The solution has been running nicely since that time.
It will be nice to rely on the tool for guaranteed message delivery. Developing this type of functionality is generic and doesn't have a lot of business value by itself. It's great that MS has recognized this need and placed the capability in their product. MSMQ is a nice tool, but try selling an MSMQ-based solution into mid-market companies with less than first class IT support - it's just not feasible.
I finally got NantContrib working, what a pain! This is one of those “don't try this at home experiences”. I got it working between setting up a series of cubes on SQL Server 2000 using SQL Analysis Services. I'll have to draw up the steps I took and blog them later.