Kevin et al,

I'm seriously thinking about making the switch to MM .Net. I've been using MM VFP for the past 18 months, and I've really come to appreciate it - especially the business objects.

I have a few questions, which are part MM and part .Net I was hoping folks could answer:

1) After reading Rick Strahl's last couple of FP Advisor articles on integrating .Net with VfP, I've developed a perception that distributing desktop applications is troublesome if users have an OS older than Win2000. Is this an accurate perception? How easy is it to distribute desktop applications? In VFP, it's a snap with Installshield.

2) I see significant advantages to continuing to use VFP as the backend. It's fast, it's freely distributable with a licensed copy, and maintenance is much easier and straightforwsard than server based backends (at least that is my perception). What kind of performance hits would I take using VFP as a backend to .Net, versus VFP as a backend to VFP? Also, one great thing about MM for VFP is the ability to swap in backends to the same app. How well does MM .Net handle this?

3) I consider myself an advanced VFP user, an advanced MM user, and I have a strong grasp of OOP, UML, ORM and ER. I use them on a daily basis. Any thoughts as to the learning curve going into .Net? Is using the MM framework going to speed up the learning curve or slow it down?

4) Most of my applications do tons of batch processing. In order to do this in an OO way, there are typically tons of hits to the back end (sometimes on the order of hundreds of thousands) for a process. Any thoughts as to .Net's performance with ADO.net vs. VFP's views?

Thanks for your thoughts.

Take care,

David