We just picked up 5 new licenses for VFP9, with the more on the way. I am very happy about this decision (it was in management’s hands, certainly not mine). We are in the process of migrating a VFP7 application, which has a few hundred installations around the country, to VFP9. The move was almost squashed thanks to MS’s latest announcement. VFP9 SP1 will make our application run better, give the engineers here more features and tools, open more doors into the XML world, and allow us to bother MS for support a little while longer.
Posts Tagged Microsoft
Only a sleight deviation, I promise…I have a question for the spaces.live team. Why on earth can’t you get the headers right on these pages? Firefox can handle it, but I truly wonder what some older browsers do with this site. The W3C says this about this very page:
The MIME Media Type
(application/xhtml+xml) indicated parse mode should be XML, but the DOCTYPE Declaration indicates
SGML mode. Using XML mode based on the Content-Type header."
This is just one of 469 validation failures.
To make matters worse, this site also fails the Section 508 test (Google: “Cynthia Says”), which is designed for setting a minimum bar for accessibility standards.
OK… sorry. It’s not like my Blogger account fairs much better (but I think David Shae has some Standards-compliant templates in their somewhere…)
…and in this corner…
Apr 26
Ladies and gentlemen! Boys and girls! Step right up and watch the debate unfold. (Did you do the voice?)Most in the Fox community are frazzled by the grim reality of no more FoxPro releases. The folks at MasFoxPro are still trying to change Microsoft’s mind though, and I support them. Besides, if this works, I’ll hire them to get my 18 month old son to eat a little something more than just cookies and oatmeal (which he learned by watching me, of course).
Perhaps the best representation of the internal debate (and maybe a little in-fighting) is happening over at fox.wikis. Doug Hennig says that he will “move on and make the best of our situation”. While everyone is being forced to move on (at least to some degree, after all, VFP is a very mature language and will continue to be a valuable asset), some are slamming the door (and re-opening the door only to slam it again) while others are softly closing it.
Foxfolk, Milind Lele’s letter is posted at Microsoft.com. What I like about this letter is how he framed the decision to stop further development of VFP. Instead of Soma Somasegar’s comment about it being “hard to hear that you have to go and learn something else” (see my last entry), he focuses on addressing some of the concerns that VFP programmers are having about the announcement.
Visual FoxPro core/engine is very stable. It has been so for a very long time. In fact, many have written to me asking, why this decision given such stability/maturity? One significant aspect to consider is this: Most of the feature enhancement requests we have received in recent years is XBase components. Thus making these components open source enables the community to drive improvements and enhancements and yet leverage a stable engine.
Michael Desmond alludes to in his article, “Working in the Phone Booth“, that Microsoft’s denial of future Fox releases is part of a bigger plan (that also includes the dropping of Visual Basic 6 and J#). He asks his readers to respond:
Retiring operating systems and applications is tough. IT shops face a huge task as they migrate to software with an assured roadmap. But retiring a programming language? The mechanics of switching to a new dev platform and managing the migration of bits between languages is hard enough. The human factor is harder still. What’s your take? How should the ranks of dedicated FoxPro and VB6 developers respond to these retirements? And as a development manager, how important is it to cross-train coders and proactively move off of sunsetting platforms?
E-mail me at mdesmond@reddevnews. We’d love to hear your opinions!
Although this article seems to be a re-publication of another recent article, I felt like posting to show that the story isn’t really dead yet. This one is in ComputerWorld (http://www.computerworld.com): FoxPro Supporters Lobby to Keep DB Tool Alive.If you’ve ever used FoxPro, and would like to see Microsoft continue its development, please take a moment to support the folks over at MasFoxPro (http://www.masfoxpro.com). Sign the petition!
The 64-bit excuse
Apr 4
Old news, but it sets up my question at the end of this post: Developers petition Microsoft to reconsider FoxPro phase out
…and the response from Microsoft on April 3rd (copied from the above article):
“For Microsoft to continue to evolve the FoxPro base, we would need to look at creating a 64-bit development environment and that would involve an almost complete rewrite of the core product.”
Does anyone else feel as though the 64-bit issue is just an excuse? I’m not pretending to know what’s involved with creating a 64-bit development environment for VFP. And I’m not disputing that this is one reason for the decision. But I feel that this has much more to do with channeling more money into .NET and SQL Server then the hardships Microsoft faces by a 64-bit redesign.
Am I on an island here? Or am I the last one off the boat?
Update!
OK, I must be the last one on the island. From the ComputerWorld article, “FoxPro users petition to keep database language alive”:
“But FoxPro’s use of the open .dbf file format made it impossible for Microsoft to raise prices for the software. Even today, Visual FoxPro 9.0 lists for just $649. For no additional fee, developers can embed FoxPro in an unlimited number of their applications.”
FoxPro, though wildly popular, became a burden and an opportunity cost for Microsoft. “Every time Microsoft sold a copy of FoxPro, I think Bill Gates thought about all the money they were losing from not being able to sell a copy of SQL Server,” [Kevin] Cully [of Fox Forward] said.
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