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>Secondly, let me point out that there are several discreet components with large MS development staffs that MS continues to support and enhance that have no price tag on them. Things like IE and MSDE come to mind and I am sure that there are more.
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>Not sure if this is correct or not. IE is a key part of the platform. MSDE is really a way of extending SQL Server. At the surface, they are "free". But in reality, they are enablers of technology that rings the MS register.

First MS has never said that IE is a part of the platform. That was a major part of the basis of the anti-trust claim. MS always said that IE could readily be replaced by NetScape or whatever.
Why can't you see that VFP is also an "enablers of technology that rings the MS register"?
Firstly, it keeps smaller outfits in the Windows fold where otherwise MAC or Unix might prevail. Secondly, it helps to sell SQL Server by providing a legitimate migration path.

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>So this idea that the mighty dollar is the only factor relevant for the continued life of any specific product is really a fallacy.
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>I don't think this is true. Ken himself came up here and said the most important thing Fox developers can do is upgrade. That means the $'s are the key driver.

C'mon John. Would anyone expect Ken to say anything else? My point is that it isn't the ONLY issue.

SNIP
>IAC, don't fool yourself into thinking that money is not the issue. The day VFP is not cost justifiable is the day it gets capped and goes into support mode. This goes for any product at MS and VFP is no different, nor should it be.

Then IE and MSDE and others should go too. Like I said, there's more than just raw profit.

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>If $ only was the case then the IE support folks would be far more productive for the corporation if they were put into the VFP team instead of costing all that money doing IE development and support.
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>Because IE is part of the platform, my guess is that this is internally funded stuff managed through various cost accounting procedures..


And VFP could too. And IE is not "part of the platform".

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>Thirdly, there are ways for the VFP product team to make additional revenue. The one that comes clearly to my mind is a reasonably priced optional component that allows VFP to run as a true server for user-chosen databases and free tables. I have such a request sitting in the Toledo wish list for well over a year now.
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>How much would it cost to do this?
>Could MS make the money back?
>What other features would you have to give up to do this?

Clearly only internal MS can answer those questions (except the third, which 99% of the time has to be "none"). For you or me to pretend that we can even come close would be stupidity of the highest order.


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>Before you can address what MS can do, you have to address whether it wants to. I think it is patently clear that MS has no interest in pushing the product beyond the scope of people that already use the product. MS has to do very little in order to keep the masses happy.
SNIP

Yep, this is an excellent question and an equally good observation.
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>Committment to a product is marked by the dollars allocated. Dollars warranted are driven by the market. Any way you look at it, it is thumbs down for VFP... I think you have answered your own question here...

Boy I'm good - answered a question that I didn't even ask < s >. *My* point was, in fact, that we have done well with a very limited MS staff (and related) budget allocation for VFP but that others using dollars allocated as the yardstick see/report otherwise.
From what I've read, Albert Einstein was unkempt, both in dress and hair. I suppose that anyone reporting on an event where he sat at a head table but wasn't introduced to speak might report that a rubbie had intruded but was politely handled by the organizers.

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>In doing so the VFP Team said that the community would benefit from its being able to do things on its own schedule.
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>That is marketing spin Jim and the sooner you learn how to pick this stuff out, the better off you will be...

Sure, but it was my next statement that made the point of value.
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>More than one statement about this has also alluded to the extreme overhead implied in being within VS.NET, not the least because .NET is being fully integrated into Windows OSs. The onerous testing requirements and documentation standards and other overhead inherent in being within .NET would not only take away from wanted features development but it also would greatly limit maintenance and version release schedules.
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>Now VFP is much akin to Powerbuilder or Delphi. Its developers are faced with identical constraints, though the VFP Team does have the advantage of being "on the inside" and so being privy to information, and possible assistance through internals, that are unavailable to the other product developers.
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>Not so much anymore since the decree was handed down by the court.

Maybe for insider advantage, but not for anything else. PowerBuilder and Delphi continue to 'grow' and there is no reason for VFP to do otherwise.

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>Finally, I think that it is reasonable for MS to permit VFP to continue to grow in features (especially those that are aimed at future exploitation of MS cash cows like SQL Server and Office) while the .NET initiative continues to evolve. While MS has the bucks to market the hell out of .NET, that alone will not gaurantee the success of .NET. My best guess on the matter (basically uninformed but intuitively based) is that .NET will "succeed" but most likely in a far smaller and more specialized way than MS originally and currently envisions. My take is that, in the end, it will more or less mirror MS' success with SQL Server and be nothing like the success MS had with Windows itself.
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>Don't you think if MS wanted to do anything, it would have by now. When MS wants to do something, it does it. Do you realize that more probably gets spent on the XBox in one day than what gets spent on Fox in 6 months or a year????


I do think that if MS was going to do anything, it would have by now. It has NOT stopped development on VFP, has it!!
Sure XBOX and .NET and lots of others get more $ than VFP does. As I said earlier, people who use that as their only guide are doing an incomplete assessment.