Visual Objects is no longer a CA product, instead (and like dBase) it is now developed by one of their larger dealers/consultants, GrafXSoft who took over in April 2002

>Version 2.5 was released on may 1999 (Adobe document giving explanations about the free trial)
>
>Version 2.7 can be pre-ordered. But when will it be ready?
>
>So it took them close to 5 years to get from version 2.5 to perhaps version 2.7.
>To me that does'nt look good.

GrafXSoft released 2.6 in Oct 2002. It should be noted that their point releases may be as significant as going a whole version in VFP. Probably more as VFP 6 should have been considered a bug fix!.

Lets face it, by the time VFP9 comes out, only then will we have the majority of _important_ features that should have been in VFP5. Granted we will have some excellent extra bits, but some of the core stuff such has the report writer and table/view editors are only appearing now. IMHO until Ken showed up, it was definately on a downhill spiral.

>
>A fellow consultant played with version 1 for a while. He showed us what he was able to do with it. At that time it was the worst package I've seen compared to many development environments. Patches were released almost bi-weekly. Generated EXE were so slooooooow.

I think early versions of all products should be ignored. Access 1.0 was incredibly slow then, and many Fox developers still think it is, but since acquiring all the Rushmore etc from Fox, its OK. When VFP 3 came out, really a Version 1.0 product, it was dreadful, with too much, too soon, for the current hardware and OS (386/486 and Win3.1). Whoever was responsible for that release should be thunked!

>Before going to VO's site I was sure I heard that CA told that they stopped improving VO. My mistake but it does'nt look like the package is in their top priority list.
See top

>To me there's no match between VFP and VO. VFP'S a clear winner.
I think VFP developers must be the most faithful in the world. Certainly the community that was built up from the early days is all that has kept the product rolling. I remember leaving college and specifically going for a PC related job rather than a better paid mainframe job because I had fallen in love with Foxbase 2.1 (and RPG looked awful). Throughout the dos years the only contender for my heart was Clarion, but FoxPro 1.0 was just on the horizon and I did not want to learn a new syntax. Nowadays I consider VFP to be only adequate, moving closer to good with each release, but still playing catch up with a lot of lesser known RAD tools out there.

>If you decide to do that comparison let us know how it turns out.
I'd like that too. I really miss Database Advisor, with it reviews/comparsions of a complete cross section of development products. If it not .NET or JAVA, you hardly ever see anything in print anymore.
Bring it back! I want the 'mine is better than yours' flame wars of old! Lets see how VO/VFP/dBase/Clarion/WinDev/Omnis/Progress etc stack up against each other!

Sorry, getting a but carried away there :)

Regards

Malc