>>Mike, if you were to receive the go ahead to determine the feasibility of putting out a fully featured demo version of VFP v.8, how much time would it require, off the top of your head :), to have the product in the streets, or out for download... Fair question?
>
>Ehhhh, probably not a fair question. I can say (or at least I hope I can <g>; we'll find out when I read my email tomorrow morning) that Craig is correct in that it would impact the Europa feature set. I've been on the other side of the product as a consultant, and I realize that the product cycle for many folks may be played a little fast and loose compared to how we do things. By this, I mean the statement that we just change a compiler switch and ship. However, for the VFP team, rebuilding the final product is not an inconsequential thing, and takes a significant amount of time and resources for both development and testing.

I would hope that indeed is consequential! Consequential at many levels! I believe there is more than just a few scattered interested people that know it is, and some of them are real developers (smile). I interpret that the proposition being advanced is that the possitive impact of such a demo version of VFP on the public relations side as well as on the cash register (as people become exposed to the product itself) would be tremendous.

One other "policy" consideration that should be held high by the shakers and movers at Microsoft is the possitive "trickle" effect that this presence would have on the efforts of the VFP developers when they try to offer legitimate and viable solutions to the small and medium size businesses, local governments, nof-for-profit organizations, etc. who curretly react: "Visual Fox What?", and end up buying the services of much more expensive solutions that I would think are not as efficient and cost-effective as what could be offered with VFP.

Sorry I took so much of your time. Please rest assured that in many minds, here and elsewhere, the work you and your colleages are doing is nothing short of fantastic. Let's see what the next step in this area is going to be. ;)