I think you're comparing apples to oranges Jim. Linux is free, open source, etc and has been that way from day one I believe. dBase isn't free, Inprise just basically said something to the effect of: We don't see much of a future in this xBase market and despite making dBase OO we still view it as an xBase tool and non-strategic. We don't want to tell our customers directly that we don't think it's worth investing in anymore, so we'll dump it off on this little company that probably doesn't have a prayer and let them take the heat for it.

Dick