>If MS saw developers leaving for php or Python in droves, especially if the press decided to make a big deal about the exodus of the disenchanted faithful, they might try a bit harder to make NET more attractive, but they wouldn't suddenly agree to create a VFP10. Otherwise the message they're sending out is that the company is vulnerable to threats to abandon ship.
Microsoft is already vulnerable to that as it is. In fact these days Web development is dominated by LAMP development especially on the entry level and Microsoft will have to step up to make its Web platform more approachable on the low end. ASP.NET is great, but it it's an application platform not a scripting language like ASP was.
The same thing applied for VB6 and there were all sorts of idle threats in the VB6 community about leaving for non-Microsoft pastures. It never happened because in the end the path from VB 6 -> VB.NET (or even C#) was easier for most developers than the comlpetely different environments and communities.
The fact though that should be remembered is that hte VFP market has been draining for many years. The numbers of people buying the product is down the companies supporting third party products has gone down to next to nothing - the magazines died out and are only a shred of what they used to be. One left standing and its no prize. The entire eco-system for the product has been slowly going away and with it the vital community. The UT itself is thinning out - compare message counts here (especially real developer content vs. hand wringing) and look back a few years and you'll find a big decline.
So right now who do you even put as the target audience of VFP? Certainly not new developers... so it's just hanging on to existing developers who are getting fewer and fewer and this was even before the announcement.
Microsoft has pretty accurate market information about sales and usage and I suspect they eventually reached a critical point in their statistics and decided that that's it.
But from the other end is what things should have been done if there's a version 10.0? Most of the suggestions that are provided on the wiki for V 10 are either along the lines of making changes to the engine along the lines that can't be done without complete overhaul, or things that can be possibly done out side of the engine altogether ala Sedna.
Heck I have a wish list 10 pages long for VFP but those issues haven't been addressed since VFP 5.0 <s>...
>In any case, they don't believe that people will abandon ship. I'm reliably informed that the message they're getting from current and previous VFP MVPs is that the flock will mostly move to NET. Under these circumstances the best thing MS can do is (excuse mixed metaphors ;-) ) wait for the storm to pass and the sheep will come home.
>That's where it's at IMHO.
From Microsoft's POV there's 0 upside in continuing VFP onwards - even if all developers left head of to non-Microsoft tools (which is unrealistic).
Everybody can think for themselves I hope and make their own choices and certainly I would encourage looking at all the options and not just .NET. Certainly the LAMP platform is thriving as well as .NET is these days. Business is good on all ends of the spectrum so choices are many.
The key is to find what best fits your business environment. For some that will be .NET for others it will be Phython,PHP etc. I'd venture to guess though that the experience is still closer for people on the microsoft side of the house...
And there's always the option of continuing on with VFP. On the server especially it's unlikely that VFP will be broken even by future OS changes.
I'm obviously biased and I make no bones about it, but I also see alot of ex-FoxPro folks at .NET shows, user groups etc. and most of these guys are not griping one bit about the decision they've made. Not anymore at least (after having put in their dues)...
