>How can I prevent vfp6 from setting a code page in a table and making it unreadable by the 2.5 applications. All new activity in the table will be done by a 6.0 appliaction, yet all sorts of legacy application will be hitting the table also.

I have an application in FPD2.6 and VFP6 that share a 2.6 table. The VFP6 application does not try to convert the table. Just ensure that you don't try to alter the table's structure in VFP6. Just make sure that you don't put the table into a database. I am pretty sure 2.5 and 2.6 have the same structure.