>I'm kind of bummed about Visual InterDev going away though.

Jeff;

These days (daze?), I am required to use Visual Interdev, as my main development tool, with SQL Server 7.0. This is a corporate requirement and I do my consulting from home with "the best tool for the job", be it VFP, VB, C, dataflex or whatever.

As for Visual Interdev, in a way I will miss it, and wish Microsoft had taken it further. Perhaps it reached the "end of the road", as a development tool as .NET has taken another path. Now, I will be working with a soon to be obsolete tool, that will quickly have no support. This is not a good feeling as when I start looking for another position I do not like to be using tools that are not even in use!

My greatest strength is Visual FoxPro, and I have a list of National and International clients whom I have created applications for. For the last year I have been working for a group (Toyota and General Motors), and for the last 13 months have been writing a major web application for them. When I was hired, my resume stated my client list and specific VFP accomplishments and training. I was interviewed three times by all the major players and gave a demo of one of my applications (for a major California Water Department). One person who interviewed me did not want to hire me because of my VFP experience.
That person makes the decisions as to what tools we use and is not a programmer.

For the last year I have done everything possible to get the corporation to allow me to use VFP, and even gave demos for desk top and Web Applications. It did not impress the "correct party". I even went so far as to create a form required in my project using Visual MaxFrame. It took 12 minutes and had more functionality that the ASP page. The ASP page took 40 hours and it was not fully complete. My management went to bat for me but "city hall" won. No VFP will be used on any of our servers!

It is a pain to work with a great group but we have to use a tool and technology that is not appropriate for the task at hand. With VFP 7.0 and Visual MaxFrame 6.0 just on the horizon and .NET as well, I am going to enjoy my consulting even more by using these new tools.

Regardless of if we are consultants or work at a corporate office, we have to make a decision to either accept things as they are or do something about it. As for myself, I am going to use some of my spare time each week to learn more about what tools are available and how to use them. I am sure many other developers will be doing the same. Others will be content with maintaining legacy code. I understand there are some dBaseII and FoxBase programs out there still in use. So there is “something for everyone in the world of programming”. Stand still for five minutes in this profession and watch the mold begin to grow.

Tom