1. A computer program product, tangibly embodied in an information carrier, for browsing meta data, the computer program product being operable to cause data processing apparatus to: receive, by an agent, a request to retrieve information about or relating to one or more aspects in a back end system; read a portion of meta data, the meta data being stored in a repository and representing the back end system, wherein the portion of meta data that is read is based on the request; format, by the agent, the portion of the meta data to produce a response in a normalized format; and transmit the response in the normalized format in response to the request.