Hi Richard,

I used StrataFrame on a large project for about two years and have good experience of the tool. I have a current license for DeKlarit (which is excellent) and I also use DevForce which likewise, is excellent.

If you take away the "number of developers" arguments, the tools you have referred to are each very different so, you should avoid comparing "Apples with Oranges". Some of the frameworks mentioned have very differing capabilities and approaches to things. Some have very much more intelligence than others, particularly:-

• Their ability to discover and map the whole of the target database schema and automatically handle all relationships (some just have simplistic mapping to a single table)


• The design and scalability of their business objects and the usability of the business object with other non-framework components (in otherwords, how nicely they play with the rest of the world around them)


• Some are basically aimed at Winforms and don't really offer very much when it comes to web applications


• Some, due to design limitations, are really best for fairly simple applications, whereas others will really scale and provide true enterprise capabilities


• Some provide very proprietary solutions to implementing common use-cases that can (and arguably should) be handled with more "standard" approaches

For example, DeKlarit is a very different tool to StrataFrame, MM.Net and DevForce - it is not a framework in the same sense as the latter three. However, from a design and modeling perspective, it can do things that StrataFrame, MM.Net and DevForce just cannot do. I find myself using DeKlarit for modeling and prototyping the business entities and their relationships and generating the database schema, and then use my framework of choice to actually build the application.

There are also other excellent tools that have not been mentioned in this thread that you should be aware of - likewise, some are low cost, some are free.

So as you can see, you need to decide what is important to you, but more importantly, what should be important to you that you haven't yet realized (due to lack of experience in the .NET world). Often, you only find out the restrictions of what you have invested in when it is too late.

Unfortunately, I have learned over time that trying to offer unbiased advice in a public forum like this can often offend the sensibilities of interested parties so I will refrain from making a recommendation publicly. However, I feel I am uniquely experienced in this area and I would be happy to take this conversation off-line if this would help you. In this case, feel free to email me privately.

HTH

Best,