>>Well, I just finished reading the article on VFP 6 in this month's FoxPro Advisor. Perhaps the article focussed mainly on things of interest to the author, I don't know, but if that's all there is, I certainly feel very down indeed.
>
>It's not so much "where do you want to go today", I think this release is taking us where Microsoft wants us to go:
>Multi-tier and client-server applications.
>Web enabled applications (STRTOFILE and FILETOSTR, plus enhanced string concatenation, JPEG image support)
>Using COM to produce middle-tier components.
>New _Access and _Assign methods will change OO design implementations.
>
>
>All of which is of little interest to the solo consultant whose business is desktop and LAN applications.
>But then those people are probably happy with VFP 5.0, apart from the non-object menus and reports.

Paul, I agree with your premise that MS is leading us where THEY want us to go, but I disagree with your theory that this is of little interest to the solo consultant. 2 of my last 3 bids have included web access for outside sales, although each of the companies were fairly small (< 500 people) and with only one main office.

I'm extrapolating to a view of much more web-intensive applications, and also to each app being capable of easy links to an Access or VB or Java app. Many of the new areas of VFP6 will help this. If my husband-the-mortgage-broker is putting loan apps on the web and my 82-year old stepmother is designing a web page (OK, I do the coding for her) this is the shape of the future!

And personally, I think the _Access and _Assign methods and the new Project methods will simplify my programming life considerably. If I'm more productive, I have happier clients.

Barbara