>I meant functionality is still the same, which is a good thing for clients, by the way, and bad for MS. I don't see a reason to beat that horse again. VFP allowed a developer catching 'too much' profits between end-user and software vendor, i.e. client could pay to developer leaving vendor aside; it could not last for long. People did not upgrade from 6 to 9, because 6 was quite sufficent for business purposes, especially comparing with 9.

If this is true, then MS would have stopped with C++ development from version 6 (Visual Studio) or before. I can program in C++ all the capabilities that are in subsequent releases (or even in C -- I have even seen a developer do windows development solely in Assembler). And I don't pay MS any royalities for the software that I build and sale. As for a database back-end, I don't have to use MSSQL either -- there are lots of other options that many use (some commercial and others free). So an argument that MS stopped FoxPro due to lack of revenue in way of licensing is invalid.

Any product that a commercial vendor develops must have a revenue stream -- and that revenue stream must meet the expectations of a profit margin. Otherwise any vendor will stop producing no matter what the popularity of prior versions are.