>It appears to me that one of the biggest advantages to frameworks is that they help with the early stages of creating a new application for developers who develop many applications. I on the other hand am just working on a very few applications which will take years to finish. Am I wrong about fraweworks or do they offer me less advantages than others receive?

Eddie,

For the most part I am only developing one large commercial application and I choose to use a framework. I use the Mere Mortals framework and have been very pleased with the decision. Depending on your OOP experience, there is a big learning curve in the beginning, but a huge payoff down the road. For me the framework has helped:

- learn through excellant documentation
- write better OOP code
- saved hundreds of hours in developing built-in objects
- build n-tier applications
- easily allowed me to switch my application to client/server
- gain a better understanding of COM
- integrate with 3rd party utilities from Stonefield (highly recommended)
- good peer and developer support here on the UT in the Mere Mortals section

All in all an excellant value. If you consider the Mere Mortals framework, I highly recommend the training. You will learn an incredible amount in a short period of time and be amazed at how much is built in. It will not only jump start your project, but give you a solid foundation for future needs.

Kind Regards,

Mat