John,
What about performance? I thought that Oracle has a faster data engine than SQL Server (but slower than VFP, no doubt). I think that Oracle is also more scalable and internet-ready (especially with Oracle 8i) as well as suitable for ANY platform. I agree it's probably more of a pain to maintain because of all the OS stuff you have to do and undoubtedly more expensive.
-JT
Jeff Trockman, MCP