Every time I talk about ADO.NET Data Services, I mention that they can be consumed by any API that allows you to make http requests.  I usually show how you can use the Add Service Reference feature of Visual Studio to generate proxy classes to make it simple to interact with the data service.  Finally, I mention that Java and PHP toolkits exist to accomplish similar levels of developer productivity.  However, I don’t think I have ever put links to those toolkits in any of my presentations.  Here they are:

http://tinyurl.com/DataServicesJava

http://tinyurl.com/DataServicesPHP

SharePoint 2010 exposes lists as an ADO.NET Data Service.  Therefore, you can use these toolkits to interact with SharePoint!