I have been contracted to assist a company migrating thier VFP appliation to use a SQL Server 2000 backend. They have 300+ users, and 3 programmers. The application has around 100 tables (some of which of course are 'static') and probably around 150 forms, maybe as many reports.

Well, the current application uses no local views at all, and no framework was used. Needless to say they are experiencing a lot of table coruption, hense their desire to goto SQL Server 2000 backend.

What I see needing to be done is to completely re-write the whole application. Use a framework this time, and a bunch of remote views, etc, and put the business rules in a COM object.

My problem is that the 'lead programmer' there seems to be fighting me on this. What he wants to do is to move one table at a time from VFP to SQL, then rework each form and report that uses this table. He's willing to admit that this will take 'a little bit longer', but trying to talk him out of this idea is like talking to a brick wall. His claim is that there are too many changes happing in the old application and it would be 'impossible' to keep track of this information so it could be done in a 'new application'. I naturally brought up the concpet of maybe documenting these changes as they happened somewhere, and his response is "never done that, never will". I think this is f---ing nuts, they're going to be rewriting the same reports and forms over and over dozens of times! Plus this doesn't seem like a very 'stable' situation to have the data in either.

Which brings me to what I need advise on.
1. Am I right about redoing the whole application? (Obviously I think I am)
2. Assuming I am, I've got this programmer telling the guy who's paying me (his boss and VP of the whole company) one thing, and I'm telling him something different, so how the heck to I convince this VP that I'm right? All he is worried about is 'what is safest, and best for the company' and has no computer programming knowledge at all.