I believe you are absolutely correct about this. This is why whenever I've been in a position to hire additional programmers a high percentage of resumes list the candidate as an "owner" at some point in their career. Yet they are now interviewing for a corporate position.
I'm curious about the statistics in other languages. But I would venture the percentage to be 30-40% in VFP.
When I've dealt with friends dealing in this market, they are constantly complaining about non-payment, clients who expect so much for free they are loosing money on that particular client, etc. Not to mention how the work is scatter-shot so you need excellent sales skills so you can go out and find your next client.
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My point is that millions of decisionmakers out there are keen to save $. They don't want to upgrade OS or hardware if there is an alternative. Millions of these people are NOT storing their accounting, payrol etc in C/S databases. They use local files.
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>IMHO this is a tremendous business opportunity for VFP just as it is now- no CLR, no Sedna.
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>That's it. Picking apart the examples is a red herring. You may be serving a different customer base, but IMHO the traditional corporate markets are a shrinking opportunity whereas the small business market is a vast opportunity. >
>You've made this statement before, and I think it's misleading.
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>In many ways, it's more difficult to leverage solutions to this market. Too many non-standard factors and implementations, and too little revenue opportunities. Yes, many installations use local files. Find out all the reasons why (which includes hack after hack after hack), consider how much (or how little) they're willing to pay, and ask yourself what kind of multiplier effect you'll gain.
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>Sure, some shops make enough coin on these types of setups to sustain a business - for a brief period.
(On an infant's shirt): Already smarter than Bush