Hi Joe -

First, a disclaimer: I have been teaching development in Visual FoxExpress for over two years, am the author of their training CDs and other materials, and work on development projects in partnership with Mike and Toni Feltman at F1 Technologies. But I have no stake in sales of the framework itself. I got involved with them as a very satisfied customer long before we were otherwise affiliated.

That said, I think one consideration in choosing a framework is whether or not you are a professional developer or this is just a tool you need to write an app that is just part of your job.

In other words, are you investing in learning a tool with which you will make a living or are you just getting a tool to get one job done quickly. Some frameworks have a steeper learning curve, but pay off down the road with a more robust design.

There are also issues of n-tier design. Are you preparing the app for client-server deployment? Not all frameworks lend themselves to n-tier development.

What training materials are available for the framework (classes, 3rd party books, CD based training etc - obviously we have all three or I wouldn't have mentioned it < bg >)

If you have any questions specifically about VFE, stop by our website at www.f1tech.com and check out the support forum.

FWIW, if I were not using VFE I'd probably be looking at Mere Mortals - nicely designed with a good community of developers I respect.

In any case, I think you are wise to be looking at frameworks and am surprised that more developers have not seen it is most cost effective to extend VFP with tested tools and devote one's own time to solving business problems with an enhanced development environment.

There are certainly developers who are qualified to write their own frameworks - and they know who they are - but they are few and far between, and many of them simply decide it is not cost effective to spend the time it takes to do it properly when there are very robust frameworks available which cost less than a day's pay.

>I'm selecting a framework for a medium sized application and am looking at these:
>
>Oakleaf's Mere Mortals Framework
>IAS Application Framework
>FoxSolutions Application Framework
>Visual MaxFrame Professional (VMP)
>SoftClassics CodeMine
>Visual FoxExpress
>
>I've looked at demo apps and documentation (such as they are) for the above and am making comparisons to VFPs gererated applications.
>
>Can anyone who has worked with any of there offer some input.
>
>After a quick first pass I'm leaning a little toward CodeMine.
>
>Thanks,
>Joe