Joe,

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>>Second, these supposed "Microsoft officials" either violated an NDA, aren't in any position to know, or are simply speculating themselves. If it's the former, how trustworthy and reliable source of information would you consider them? The same question would apply to the latter two possibilities.
>
>I agree, and at this point I don't trust the source. But I am not the guy making the decisions. All I need is someone of better authority than the guys they talked to to say yes, there will be VFP after 8.0, or it is at least as likely as continued support of .NET (because I know nothing can be truly guaranteed).

Who is the better authority than MS CEO Steve Ballmer? You can watch or read his talk about VFP at http://msdn.microsoft.com/vfoxpro/prodinfo/ballmer.asp.