Hi Bill, and others who may be reading this thread.

>There's an embarassing wrap-up to an article in the latest FoxPro Advisor (September 2002). Written by Daryl Moore, it's titled "Security Fundamentals for VFP Developers". The article itself is perfectly fine and informative, discussing issues as cryptography, general tips for secure development, COM+ and other technical issues.

Thanks for the compliments for the majority of the article. I had fun writing it although I wouldn't consider myself a high-powered expert in security. I do have some experience in day-to-day and common sense techniques for keeping things safe.

>But the end of the article doesn't recap the body of the article. Instead, the FoxPro Advisor reader is scolded.

My intention was most certainly not to scold my fellow Visual FoxPro developers. I don't see myself as any more "enlightened" as anyone else, so my comments are to be taken as seriously as you would from someone else you know as well as me.

I've always professed well-roundedness even before the .Net days. I have worked in many languages throughout my career as a developer and FoxPro has been the only consistent one. I do, however, believe that .Net technologies (whatever form, VB, C#, Perl, Python, XSL/T, COBOL, or whatever) are a safe and practical technology to learn for Visual FoxPro developers since there has been a huge Microsoft-industry push towards them.

I'm sorry that you see my article in a negative light because it is Microsoft-centric. There's no doubt at all that it is, in fact, Microsoft-centric. I know and work with Microsoft tools--almost exclusively. I'm actually not ashamed of that and I'm only going to talk about what I know. I can't comment on Delphi, Kylix, or Powerbuilder because I've never used them.

>Analysis: Geez, where to begin.
>
>Scolding developers on their choice of tools within a Windows Security article is so out of place as to be embarrassing. This is the Microsoft Bigger Hammer School of Dentistry Marketing Technique. No mention of non-Microsoft technologies or development environments. No mention of why a developer should learn .NET at the exclusion of other development languages. How about Delphi? How about Kylix? How about PowerBuilder? What about Oracle? Hell, what about Visual FoxPro?????

The relevance of .Net is somewhat tongue-in-cheek in this article, but it is relevant. The title I was given to work with was "Security for Visual FoxPro Developers." That was the only guideline I was given so I could easily have written an entire article about building and maintaining job security. I will admit the possibility that the article didn't flow well, or that it wasn't written in a format in which you, or anyone else would expect it to be in. I am a new writer having only been published twice for technical articles.

But I don't agree that the section about job security was embarassing. I'm not embarassed, and I'm sorry if you feel that way. Job Security is a big deal for indpendent developers (speaking from my personl experience) and the FoxPro job market is tight--at least in the Northwest. I want to continue to work in the software field and I simply can't hold out for only FoxPro jobs. In my opinion, FoxPro developers would bode well to learn .Net technologies for the sake of their security as independent developers (since we know a large percentage of FoxPro developers are independent.) If Delphi works for you then I'm happy for you. But I know nothing about it so I can't recommend it.

>I know Daryl personally and I don't think he wrote that last section, IMO.

So, yes, I did write it--including the job security section (I haven't actually read whatever version was printed in the mag, but I got a pretty late proof in email). Sorry I have destroyed your image of me. ;)

>Note: The most hysterical, ridiculous .NET marketing hype was around February - April of this year -- probably around the time this article was submitted.

I believe my final submission was sometime in July. But there's no doubt that I have bought into the .Net marketing machine... ;)

Daryl