>xBase market is not the same as VFP market. And even if the xBase market as a whole decreases, this doesn't mean that the VFP market decreases, as well. It could increase while the other decrease even more, making up a decreasing market as a whole. Have these marketing research people specifically looked at the VFP market? Otherwise, their result would be unusable.
>

VFP, like Visual dBase is an xbase dialect, with OO extensions.... Like it or not, VFP is considered to be in the xBase market. Source - the Gartner Group. I don't necessarily agree that VFP should be catagorized with xBase tools. However, it is not a matter of how I feel, it is a matter of what *is*...

>It's not the growing of a market alone that determines whether Microsoft invests, or not. It's a) future expectations about this market and b) the total of this market. A market might increase by a few 100 percent, if only 1000 people are making up this market, it's not interesting for a low-priced product.
>

Christof, I am not sure what you are trying to say here. I will say that MS does not, nor will it invest in a market that is not growing, or is not perceived to have any potential to grow. FWIW, MS does invest money in VFP. MS however, will not invest money to the degree that would constitute an attempt to grow the market. For you, I, and every other developer, there is an upside. For MS the corporate entity, and more important, for MS stockholders, which I am one, it is not a good business decision.

I know I am labeled Mr. Negativity here.. Sometimes however, the truth and reality is very hard to take....

>And how many other FoxPro DevCons where in 1993, how many there were this year? To compare these numbers, you would have to compare the total number of distinct developers attending any session.
>


I don't see the number of Devcon's as an indicator of market health. If anything, too many devcons have the effect of diluting the market place. I am so sorry I missed the German Devcon this year. I had my shot to speak, but had another committment. I am looking forward to next year. From what I have heard, it is the BEST run show on the planet. With Rainer at the helm, I have no doubt of this.

>No-one here doubts that the market has decreased between 1993 and 1999, but that's not the point. We are talking about whether the market increases compared to, say, 1998.
>

Christof, you are talking about a 1 year trend. I am talking about a 6 year trend. In the aggregate, it is a shrinking market. FWIW, I don't think the market increased between 98 and 99. Even if it did, it could not be by much. And, to be significant, you would need several years of increasing activity to substantiate your claim...


>>That is why you don't see the quantity of VFP books on the market in relation to other tools such as VB, Java, C, etc....
>
>Really? I can think of a number of other reasons, why there are more books for other languages than for VFP.
<

Well, I am not sure how that goes to discredit my argument. The fact is, for tools like VB, there are very granular books - VB-UML, VB-MTS, etc.... Main stream publishers won't do the same sort of thing for VFP, since enough of a market does not exist for their business models. Thank goodness for folks like Hentzenwerke and Prima Publishing for picking up the slack