Creating a reliable network to successfully run a multi-user VFP application is not trivial and will be mostly beyond the scope of a typical VFP developer. However, I believe the community would be well-served if VFP product documentation and/or an MSKB article could be created:

Server and Workstation Registry Entries for Visual FoxPro Applications

There are several registry entries such as Opportunistic Locks, Cached Open Limit etc. which are documented in the MSKB and MSDN. However, there is no discussion about what, if any, effect their settings have on VFP applications in a networked environment. Some of these keys/values do not even exist in a default OS installation.

From time to time advice has come up on this forum (and probably elsewhere) but not, to my knowledge, from MS personnel, so it cannot be considered authoritative.

I imagine all currently supported versions of VFP have been extensively tested in a networked environment, and that the VFP Team should be aware of all applicable registry settings and their effects. I urge the Fox Team to document them, from the viewpoint of VFP developers:

- Network file system-related Registry entries currently in MSKB/MSDN: which ones
- Improve/reduce performance, and why
- Improve/reduce reliability, and why
- Have no effect
- Recommended settings, with special emphasis if different from the default

- Other Registry entries that may affect VFP performance or reliability

- If necessary, differences in Registry settings for different VFP versions

- Differences in Registry settings for different OSs

- Differences in Registry settings for different combinations of workstations and servers. For example, different settings may be recommended for W95 workstations/W2K Server vs. WXPPro workstations/W2K Server vs. W98 peer-to-peer.

- Any other information that may be of interest to VFP developers or for troubleshooting.

Ideally, if Vendor X comes along and says "My application requires that Server Registry Setting Y be set to Z" then the VFP developer should be able to say, "That will cause my VFP app to slow down/become unreliable. You might want to put it on a separate server.".

In a perfect world, such documentation would mention the Novell client and that it should be set up conservatively in Novell environments. Any knowledge of running in Linux/Samba environments (which are becoming more common) would be appreciated as well.

Thanks for your consideration.