>Having said that, I notice that companies looking for developers generally are looking for someone wiht experience in Sybase, Oracle or Powerbuilder. Why is this? Is it because these products have been around longer and have a broader base? Or is it because they are superior products?
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I might add that some of the "promoters" of the industry (e.g., Gardner Group) have really bad-mouthed Foxpro over the past few years. They had a big impact at my own agency, several years ago, convincing Systems to forget FP move to PB/Sybase. Also FP was in a kind of transition stage, and the future was not clear (and MS support was mixed), and that didn't help.

Now there is some regret, since my agency has gone totally MS, and they're stuck with non-compliant PB/Sybase ware. Also, PB/Sybase adds an extra layer of cost and complexity that may not be needed (unless a system is REALLY huge). We are doing two concurrent systems, one in vfp, the other in PB/sybase...thay're both medium-to-large sized, and our system is way ahead and has spent much less money using vfp. I see PB/Sybase first-hand, and while I'll say that PB is really a pretty good product, vfp holds its own very well against it, at less cost, and is better positioned for integration with other MS products (VS!)...2 more cents...