>>The backdrop is that I was brought in as a contractor at a small local company that was acquired by a very large company in May. One of the main reasons they bought the company is they believe the acquired company had some sophisticated software algorithms that will provide a cost advantage against competitors. They have similar operations around the country and want the rewrite here to be rolled out to other locations, maybe all of them. They just don't have any intention of rolling a VFP/DBF application around the country.

How difficult is it to isolate the algorithms? If that's what really matters, you can be a hero by separating that from the rest of the rewrite that may be very straight-forward.

I agree with others who say that partial rewrites with replicated data is going to be tricky. I'm assuming we're not talking local views, but USE...SCAN...SEEK?

Depending how many tables etc are in use, one thing you might consider immediately is xcase that will allow you to move data and structures transparently between the existing and new systems.