Foxpro Support - Future of Foxpro

Why should I invest in converting to Visual FoxPro when Microsoft will no longer support foxpro after 2015?
Visual FoxPro with its integrated Database, Object-Oriented Development Environment, SQL Engine and Report Writer delivers more capability, and more real Rapid Application Development potential, in a single, (relatively) lightweight, royalty-free distributable form than any other product on the market.
One of the main reasons for Microsoft stopping foxpro support is that Visual FoxPro does not fit into the Microsoft "vision" for software development where everything generates revenue for Microsoft.
Migrating to .Net with a SQL Server requires an investment in hardware and support capabilities and that is more expensive in both the short term (initial acquisition), and the long term (maintenance and support)
.NET/SQL Server combination falls short as a replacement environment for the type of LAN-Based, Desktop PC, application that is the traditional home of the VFP Application.
The vast majority of small/medium sized businesses run applications that are LAN-based on desktop PCs and have neither the infrastructure, nor the capability (let alone the money) to re-architect their environments to maximize compatibility for .net.
As there will be no new versions, VFP will not be able to take advantage of new operating systems, or hardware, that may come along. But, as long as operating systems continue to support 32-bit applications (all OS existing today support 32 bit) then VFP will continue to work and applications and investment in VFP will continue to be viable.
The increasing reliability and capability of virtual servers that allow different operating systems to run concurrently on the same physical hardware, opens up a whole new future for VFP
Running a VFP application on a virtual server that has Windows XP or other 32-bit OS means that existing foxpro applications continue to work, as they do now, but it is also possible to still take advantage of new hardware and new software for other functions.
Even without the virtual server there are plenty of FoxPro for Dos and FoxPro 2.6 for Windows applications still running today. These were designed for 16 bit environments yet they still work adequately many years after the product in which they were created passed out of existence. So it will be with Visual FoxPro.




Is FoxPro or Visual FoxPro dead? Should I convert my FoxPro / Visual FoxPro application to something else?
Microsoft’s announcement about stopping support to Visual FoxPro just means that Microsoft will not make any more changes to Visual FoxPro. But they do not need to as VFP programs runs fine on today’s computers. As long as a computer with a 32 bit operating system is provided, Visual FoxPro applications can be run on that computer.
Microsoft has not supported FoxPro for DOS for since the late 90s but there are still thousands of such programs in use today.
According to Alan Griver, head of Visual Studio data team at Microsoft, there are more applications running in FoxPro 2.6 than there are in Visual FoxPro and FoxPro 2.6 hasn't been supported since the 90’s. Visual FoxPro 9 will be supported by Microsoft through 2015.
Once the time does come to convert Visual FoxPro applications, which will not be at least until the end of the next decade, there will be technologies available that are vastly superior to the alternatives available today. So, if you go to the enormous expense of converting to say .NET with a SQL backend, you may find yourself converting again in 10 years.
Concerns about the future of Visual Foxpro are not sustainable atleast until the end of the next decade or even further. An investment in either upgrading or enhancing your current Foxpro program now will be secure for the future and until a time when a better technology can be found that would provide the same robustness, effectiveness and cost economy a Foxpro program would. There will be programmers and developers who will keep providing Foxpro support for applications in the forseeable future.