My personal preference would be to continue to use VFP to parse the flat files from the state into dbfs and then push the data to sqlserver.

:o)

Once the data is in the backend, use any/all of Craig's suggestions from that point on. there are plenty of front end ui options, architecture and pattern options, report writer options, etc.

However, there are options for parsing flat files using C#.

One option is to use xml templates to do it:
http://articles.techrepublic.com.com/5100-10878_11-6156780.html

Another generic parser option:
http://www.codeproject.com/KB/database/GenericParser.aspx

Parsing a flat file into xml (from there you can go into sqlserver or other options) using C#:
http://www.c-sharpcorner.com/UploadFile/rmcochran/FlatFileToXmlDocument06302007111353AM/FlatFileToXmlDocument.aspx

Or linq to text files:
http://blogs.msdn.com/b/ericwhite/archive/2006/08/31/734383.aspx

Or using regular expressions:
http://visualstudiomagazine.com/articles/2004/11/01/parse-text-files-with-regular-expressions.aspx

Using textreader and textwriter:
http://www.csharpfriends.com/Articles/getArticle.aspx?articleID=132

CSV Parser:
http://www.heikniemi.net/hardcoded/2004/10/csv-parser-for-c/

More options here:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/300671/how-do-i-parse-a-text-file-in-c

Just do some research and some tests... (I don't think you will find anything as robust as VFP for massaging data though - regardless of what you will see the .net preachers posting - although you may find an option that will meet your requirements and also provide a rich UI experience and easy reporting and a future :o)



>I was having a discussion with our CIO who doesn't know anything about Visual FoxPro (9) and has only experience with Classic ASP and VB and he thinks they were great.
>
>He also said that once we get a better programming language (C#) that because it is more efficient all our problems (being behind schedule, etc.) will go away. He also speculated that there were some great 3rd party tools that would make the data access better in C#. Of course, my experience with C# is a couple of web apps that I wrote, using MereMortals .NET and watching videos on LearnDevNow.
>
>I just do not believe that our problems are because of FoxPro.
>
>Most of the coding we do is grab data from flat files provided by the State and push the data into FoxPro tables or SQL Server tables and beat the data up and create PDF reports and spreadsheets. So, we really need and use commands like APPEND FROM SDF or Delim, SCAN FOR, Update, Insert, Replace data in current row, SQL Select etc.
>
>Does anyone know of some magical C# tools that will take the place of those useful FoxPro one-line commands? And I'm not talking about BOs here. No, I doubt it. I think for APPEND FROM (with a FOR) SDF that you would have to write a custom parser for each input in .NET.
>
>Bottom line is that I believe that our efficiency and productivity will go down and we will need more programmers not less.
>
>Yes, I know FoxPro is dead and I'm dying to program in C# only, but what is the truth?