>Rick,
>
>How are you?
>
>If you are confident you can perform string manip quicker than existing functions - is it worth discussing with Chen whether it can be incorporated directly into VFPA? Precedent is that Chen successfully added some bit manipulation stuff for AI that's much quicker than native VFP functions.
>
>I know various things have been said over the years about VFPA, but Chen continues to fix bugs and add functionality to overcome incompatibilities that otherwise risk rendering VFP unusable. VARCHAR MAX field types and screen scaling are examples of over 100 bugs or incompatibilities Chen has already fixed along with numerous enhancements. Adding your features to VFPA also makes it easier to access your good work under x64 and gives you a fellow guru to bounce ideas off! Worth a thought.
>Regards, J

The source code will be provided. People can use it for whatever purpose personal or commercial. Would be great to have Chen incorporate it. The source code will be closer to C than C++.

It should be notably faster on certain types of string access. We'll see though. If it's a failure then it won't be published. :-)

I never had an issue with Chen's talents, goals, or abilities. Only the legality. Microsoft seems completely indifferent to the cause. And Chen's in China? It's likely there are no laws being broken, or if they are China has not acknowledged those laws.

Each person gets to choose for themselves which path they walk. I admire Chen for his project and dedication. I would help him out if I were in China. But I'll never use VFPA personally because the legality where I live is still uncertain. It's not worth the risk.

What we as a community should be doing is petitioning Microsoft for the legal rights to extend and modify VFP9.EXE and related DLLs and other files. A company called Arca Noae did this for OS/2 and created ArcaOS, which is a legally licensed hacked IBM OS/2 4.5 kernel with lots of driver improvements and support for newer hardware. They did it properly and got IBM's authority to use their IP and products, and that's how we should be proceeding.