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You remind me of one of my heros, Rush Limbaugh. Controversial but thought-provoking. < bg >
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I was talking with a friend last night, and the concensus is that I am the Rush Limbaugh, Howard Stern, G. Gordon Liddy of the VFP community.

Of course, there are some who accuse me of not being a friend to Fox - of not being part of the community. IMO, I am one of Fox's best friends. I have been loyal for a long time.

I consider myself to be the brutally honest uncle in the family - the guy you can go to - to get the straight objective scoop. There are those who feel that I am attacking Ken and as a consequence, attacking the team. The fact is, I have simply stepped away from the party line and have openly disagreed with certain public policies as well as characterizations of the policy by several well known public figures.

I have asked some tough questions here. Of course, the important ones are always tough.

On one hand, I think patting the VFP community on the back and treating the community with the respect it deserves is a good thing. FWIW, it is about 5 years overdue - and sadly, about 3 years too late. This of course is not to disparage the previous staff that has worked on the product. I have always thought - and to some degree have known, that VFP, like every other product must operate within certain parameters. It just so happens that VFP's parameters are very narrow and constrained.

As I said, I think pumpiing up the VFP community is a good thing. However, when it leads into thoughts that VFP is part of the future, part of some long term commitment, that is where I see the disservice to the community. IMO, the best service and message to the community is one where the strengths of VFP are recognized - but the future is in .NET - and that a migration path needs to be made available for VFP developers. This should not be a forced thing. Rather, it should simply be made available and for those that wish to partake -will.

On a personal level, I have had to deal with this conflict. I had a VFP 8 book deal (contract in hand). The book was with a major publisher and quite frankley, took a lot of work on my part to sell the idea. When push came to shove and I had to look at things from something other than a technical arena, I realized that a business case could not be made out to justify the expenditure of time and resources - either to myself or the publisher. For that reason, I nixed the deal. It was a very difficult thing to do because on an emotional level, I believe in this product. I owe a good deal of my career to this product.

But, it can only go so far...

My loyalties are to my family, my career, my clients. My primary loyalties do not rest with a product or a specific community of developers. I know there will be people - both here on the outside and in MS on the inside that will take great offense to this. To them I say - 'Get over over it!' I am not sorry for the way I feel nor for what I have said over the past few weeks. I have received several private emails voicing support for what I have said.

The primary difference between me and many in this community - I am willing to take the heat to get a message out that I think needs saying. The fact that only a handful of people have pounced (and several of them have backed off...) says that many agree/concur with the message.

Now that I have been ex-communicated from the family - there is really nothing left to lose..

Regards,