>I am considering moving to another Windows Server / IIS private hosting firm where i can install VFP on the box and allow for user FTP access. Any recommendations? Are platforms like MSFT Azure and AWS (Lightsail) available hosting options for VFP apps?

I think your best bet is to use a VM service. You can host your own server for about $40/month (you can probably find lower but you want to make sure you check out VPS services closely). I use Vultr to host all of my sites (about 20 of them, several quite busy) and it costs me ~$56/month (which includes the Windows Server license) but this is a pretty beefy setup that's way more than what is required for small to medium size VFP applications. For a VFP server host you'll want a 2 core machine with 8megs of memory as the baseline. Always get at least 2 cores whatever you do - due to the way VMs work and use CPU power.

Shared hosting can be much cheaper but a) almost no service will have or allow you to install the VFP runtimes and b) most low cost hosts tend to have pretty shitty service for what you get.

The downside of a VM is you have to maintain it - Windows Updates, etc and you're responsible for installing everything you need on the box (VFP, FTP Server - FileZilla server is simple and free). If your primary goal is running VFP applications and FTP though upkeep will be pretty much non-existent except for the automatic OS updates.

I would stay away from Azure and AWS - they are way more expensive and dollar for dollar their VPS services are a terrible deal. Those services only make sense if you need to integrate with other services they offer such as hosted databases, load balancing, etc. Otherwise these services tend to be a waste of money for pure VM hosting that cost 2-3 times as much for similar performance as what I mentioned above.

As I mentioned Vultr isn't the only service out there there are others like Digital Ocean that have similar plans and performance. There are many others that use the same sort of infrastructure and similar pricing. But unfortunately many don't even do automated Windows VMs unless you provide your ISO and Windows license. I did a bunch of research on this a couple of years ago when I switched from a physical box to a VPS service and at the time Vultr was by far the best performing service I tried both in terms of per hardware specs to perf (ie. how the supposed CPU/Cores match to actual app performance) and performance/price - so something to consider.


+++ Rick ---