>How can I get the network's serial number, or other identifying information about the network that my VFP system is running on? How can I tell what kind of network it is (Novell, etc.)?

Native VFP works at the NetBIOS level so you can't directly get information of this type. You can get more information by using the Windows API or other low-level calls but the range of potential networks is large and the calls would need to be specific for each type. Then, after you get past all that, you may find that things like server NOS license #s are not available to remote workstations.

A very short "grid" of the variables you'll encounter:
- Hardware: Ethernet, Token-ring, ...
- Network protocol: IP, IPX, NetBEUI, ...
- Server NOS: Windows (multiple flavours, server/domain based or peer-to-peer), Novell, Linux/Samba, ...

You seem to be interested in license control. Third-party software is probably going to be your best bet to try to gather this type of information; you could search at sites like www.componentsource.com on "licensing", or Google on "anti-piracy". There may be offerings that can gather network information amongst them.

Another option would be to use hardware dongles like HASP http://www.ealaddin.com/hasp/networks.asp?cf=tl .

On another thread I suggested using the server's NetBIOS name. While not guaranteed unique, it is guaranteed to be available and unique to the NetBIOS network regardless of underlying hardware, network protocol or server NOS.