Sending a value to the Arduino with Ethernet shiel

Hello,

I would really apprecite some advice for doing this.
I have a Arduino connected to the network via the Ethernet shield. I want to find a easy way to send a value or (string,value) pairs to over the ethernet.
I tried doing it over web client mode but it gets pretty messy and complicated. What would be the easiest way to send some info. For example PIN-8 HIGH or pin-12 128 something like that.

Thank you very much.

telnet comes to mind; most modern desktop machines have some sort of telnet client.

Just open and telnet to the IPAddress of the arduino.