>My initial impression is child forms are somewhat unruly (or maybe underdeveloped). Do you agree or disagree?

I don't think the "unruly" -- you need to be aware of the settings that affect them. First the "parent" form would be set as ShowWindow=2 (As Top Level). Then the child windows would be ShowWindow=1 (In Top Level). The default setting is on the desktop area of VFP (ShowWindow=0) and then all the forms are "equal" even though one may be spawned from another. The AutoCenter, Left, and Right properties are relative the ShowWindow setting.