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Microsoft's position on Visual FoxPro and .NET
Message
From
12/06/2004 16:49:14
 
General information
Forum:
Visual FoxPro
Category:
Conferences & events
Miscellaneous
Thread ID:
00908177
Message ID:
00913098
Views:
56
>>>>Nonetheless, it is a method to get a row set. I conceded it was not like full-blown SQL - but in the end, does it matter? All of this work should be taken care of on the server anyway....
>>>
>>>John,
>>>
>>>Let me begin by stating a few facts about my job and my employer.
>>>
>>>I work for the Shaw Contract Group. We’re a part of the Shaw Industries Group. Shaw used to be a publicly traded (NYSE), Fortune 500 company, however, a couple of years ago we were acquired by Berkshire-Hathaway. Shaw was and is the largest manufacturer of floor covering in the world. The Contract Group provides carpet, both broadloom and tile, for offices, hotels, airports, restaurants and so on. In fact, I would be surprised if we didn’t manufacture some of the carpet used in the Microsoft campus in Redmond.
>>>
>>>The point of this is that this isn’t a “Mom and Pop” organization. To the contrary, it is a world-class company.
>>>
>>>My role in this is to provide financial information used on both ends of the spectrum: How much will it cost? And how well are we doing? By this I mean my work determines the cost of a product and my work determines not only how well we did in terms of our margin.
>>>
>>>In the latter case, we have what are referred to as “Efficiency Reports”. These reports tell the Financial Systems managers how we performed for the various processes involved in the manufacture of carpet. There are about 14 different processes, although some referred to as “Continuous Processes”, share the same application. One process, tufting, has approximately 30 different reports, using different groupings.
>>>
>>>We’re in the process of moving these applications from Fox tables to SQL Server. This brings me my question.
>>>
>>>Can you give me a case where, under these circumstances, it would be more cost effective to use a completely use a .NET solution rather than including Fox in it? To my way of thinking, with Fox, I can create one query to properly generate these reports against a data set from SQL Server. If, however, I go with a completely .NET solution, I have to create 30 different stored procedures (unless, of course, I set the compatibility level at 6.5 for the database, which is a bad idea.) and have 60 trips back and forth over the line, not to mention the maintenance of them. Using Fox, I can reduce this to two trips and have one query to support.
>>
>>Hi George,
>>
>>You might be able to do it with a lot fewer than 30 SPs. SPs can accept parameters, you can use string functions to build dynamic strings/statements that can be EXECUTEd on the fly, etc. You may already be using some of these techniques in Fox.
>>
>>My impression of T-SQL (based on limited experience) is that it's primitive compared to Fox, but the essential features seem to be there and you have access to the SQL engine of SQL Server, which is more complete and powerful than VFP's.
>>
>>As for more cost-effective - maybe it can never be, considering that you've already done it in Fox - why spend new money re-inventing the wheel in SQL Server? If it's complex, you're the only one who can judge that.
>
>Al,
>
>The problem isn't just the possibilities of 30 sps. The problem is also the number of trips over the line. IOW, it doesn't scale as well as querying a Fox result set. Granted it can be done without the 30 stored procedures, but a what cost in terms of server load?

Without knowing exactly what your query procedures do I can't say. As I see it some of the factors in play are:

- How much raw data are you currently pulling over the wire so Fox can process it, and how many trips does that take? Would retrieving final result sets on the server be smaller or larger than these raw data?

- How much processing is done on those data on the client once they get there? If this is a lot it could make sense to leave it in Fox. If a lot of users are running ad-hoc results at once this could beat up a server pretty bad if server SPs are used - in that case maybe putting under-utilized workstation CPU cycles to use is the way to go.

Another thing to bear in mind is that if it's done in server SPs the results are available to any device that can request execution of those SPs and receive the result set(s). It's not limited to a Windows box running VFP. Maybe not important to your organization, maybe so.
Regards. Al

"Violence is the last refuge of the incompetent." -- Isaac Asimov
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