Hi Mike:

>That's great! Is there any intention on putting out that framework as a product? I'd really like to take a look at it. Are you using any ORM or
>object databases?

It is an ORM framework (object relational mapping). We also use ORM (object role modelling) to create the objects - this is done using Visio and its ORM utility. Its a great way to model the objects of the business and when you are done with the process, it produces an ERD that is then manifested by Visio/ORM to SQL server databases. As for a product, we were going to put it out to the community, basically F.O.C. - however, a number of things have changed since last year. At the moment, it is being utilised as the back-end of a vertical market package. If that goes well, who knows but, the view is that it should at least have a couple of serious application uses before it is released to anyone.

>Did you follow the Codemine philosophy or did you need to deviate tremendously?

The way .Net works is quite different to Fox. Codemine is a brilliant framework and some of the things it does would be hard to replicate in .Net just because of the way VFP works. However, there are some excellent approaches that you can take in .Net because of its superior OOP capabilities and its event driven model.

>I'm still developing using Codemine for now, but I have a real interest
>in looking at the .Net environment, and something in a familiar framework
>would be very interesting.

The best way to get familiar is to get to grips with .Net in its "vanilla" form. Once you have grasped the basics, a well designed framework will become familiar very quickly. I am using StrataFrame almost exclusively at the moment - all winforms stuff. Strataframe is tremendous and I am producing work using StrataFrame/SQL server about as fast as I was doing with Codemine - so, if you want a .Net framework to get into, I would highly recommend StrataFrame. They have put in a lot of Codemine-like features for me, as well as a number on enterprise level SQL server enhancements and, they are currently building in a many-to-many mapper; a request I made last week and they are working on it right now. Its a nice framework.

>Also are you aware that there is a Dingo in relation to C#: http://dingo.sourceforge.net/basics.shtml

Nope! Thanks for that.

Best