There are at least a couple of ways to do this. They both have pros and cons. One would be to access all the data through ODBC. You would access the VFP tables using the VFP ODBC driver. The advantage to this is that you could just write the application using SQL Pass-through and/or remote views and easily switch data sources. The downside is that the VFP ODBC driver has some problems. Maybe someone else who's used it more than I have can weigh in on its pros and cons.

The other way would be to use views for all your data access. If you create the views in code you can easily recreate them as either local views accessing VFP data or remote views running against your Access data. This way you avoid going through the VFP ODBC driver when using native data.

Either way you'll want to keep all your SQL as generic as possible. Don't call VFP functions or UDF's in your SQL. You can always manipulate the data in VFP after you bring it down from the "back end."


>Hi,
>
>I need some ideas on how to create an application. This application will be distributed to several clients. One client has data stored in MS Access, another client - in native VFP 5.0 tables. What is the best approach to design the application?
>
>Sincerely,