In this paper, we present our approach to describe and compose services for distant learning and research activities. In this context, we propose a metadata model for indexing services with three dimensions: it can be viewed as learning resources, as services that contribute and help researchers to perform their tasks in a community and as services with a large scope. This model can be used by clients (learners/teachers or researchers) to query and discover services via for example a trader we have developed. We extend the functionality of the trader to be a composition engine enabling learners/researchers to compose several services or resources that can help them in their distant learning and research activities. We use the documents (databases, web documents, etc.) as an application for our approach of service description. For this purpose, we have decided to add an interface to the document. This allows documents to be reused and shared by using the approaches defined for web services.