>I think what I want is a COM thing. Sorry but I have spend the last few years converting old DOS FoxPro to Windows and expanding my program so I haven't got to the COM thing yet. (I'm not even sure what it is but I think it's what I'm looking for.) The program now works great most of the time but using native FoxPro tables on a server with all the PCs writing to them has it's limitations. The biggest problem is that some of the PCs are junk clones and becuase they are writting directly to the tables the data gets trashed sometimes. I can't saddle my customers with the expense and complexity of installing Microsoft SQL server. These are all very small shops with 2-10 PCs each (the largest has 15) and they are all over the country now. I am thinking of writing a VFP program that will run on a Win 2K server, take requests for and return data and validate data before it is written back. I am looking for suggestions and pointers to resources.
>
>Many thanks in advance,
>John.

I don't know about COM, but:

There are several free, or cheap, alternatives to SQL Server. The most popular seems to be MySQL. Other options include PostGreSQL, and the freely distributable version of Microsoft SQL Server, MSDE (max. 2 GB database, max. users (recommended) = 5, can be freely distributed with Visual FoxPro 7 programs).

"Write directly to disk" - Don't you use buffering?

To reduce data corruption, it often helps to issue FLUSH after saving data to disk.

HTH, Hilmar.