As I've come to the realization after our last discussion, you are looking at the business of software development from a different angle then at least 75% of most of the programmers who frequent this forum:

1) You create off the shelf products that you say you can set the standard on. That might be true in your specific situation. But I'm sure you've seen many comments here from others that is possible in many, many cases. There are too many corporations in the USA that have VFP on the "do not use" list for someone who works in a consulting firm to not run into that situation sooner or later.

2) The type of app you develop is different. You are concerned with massaging a ton of data. I don't think that is a requirement for the majority of developers in the business world. I've thought about any app I've dealt with in the last 10 years that requires a massaging amounts of data. I've not dealt with one. The last job I had probably dealt with the largest amount of data I've worked with and we installed a dotnet app (asp.net and c#). It worked quite successfully.

When you work as a consultant, such as Kevin or I and many, many others here, you must learn to support whatever tools your clients want to use. If 80% of the clients in your area require dotnet developers, you have 2 choices, learn dotnet or find another career.

>>>In any event, possessing a stable of options means (among other things) a decision previously made to be prepared.
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>Except that in such a state, your "options" are now determined by fate and/or decisions made by others that may not be in your interests.
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>This is why Roosevelt, the military, and just about any successful commentator places value on decisions, not the number of options that have accumulated for whatever reason.