>> That's what I said, and this is not the best forecast for VFP.
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>Why? First of all, the middle tier is the most important tier in a three tier system and if VFP is well suited for it, which has been discussed here ad nauseum, then that bodes well for VFP. Secondly, VFP still remains the only product in VS capable of handling all three tiers, which makes VFP the only game in town when all your dealing with is logical separation. It's still perfectly acceptable for a VFP front-end to call a middle tier (VFP or non-VFP) component. As far as MTS requiring DLLs with no UI then is the forecast bad for VB, Delphi, C++ and any other language that user interfaces can be developed in?
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>BTW, you can use any object you want in a DLL, you just can't display anything. Containers are probably more viable than custom controls because you can drop other elements into them at design time.

Mike, you don't need to convince me in these things, but my opinion means nothing here. I speak about market perspective, and I hope you agree with me that VB rates 'slightly' better, in regard to n-tier too. I don't mean technical side of issue, you know that in most business situations it's even irrelevant. We all already know that VFP, even without DBF engine, is still superb tool, but how many people on management side share this view? At best, they perceive it as: DBF is dead then VFP (if they know this abbreviation :) is dead. However, we are still alive, 'still' because the second separation we are talking about can kill the ground. Honestly, I have suspicion that whole MTS concept was born because of thin client tools are still very young and cannot do much what we're already accustomed to do in Windows application. Also, it's the way to preserve room for one venerable MS product, and believe me it's not VFP.