Foxpro going open source?

[Imaginecorp]

Dont know what to make of this:

http://www.eweek.com/article2/0,1759,2105307,00.asp?kc=EWRSS03129TX1K0000616

This article by Steven J. Vaughan-Nichols is after the one by "Yag"

I kinda want to beleave it, but this is soo against Microsofts nature that I dont think its true. Fingers crossed....

 

[Imaginecorp]

Not going to happen; some guy, seems like he works for MS says

http://www.eweek.com/talkback_details/0,1932,s=25992&a=203398,00.asp?m=22335

Sorry...

 

[mmerlinn]

How would MS benefit by releasing the source code?

I don't see any benefit for MS, so I don't see any release of the source code.

In fact, releasing the source code would probably hurt the MS bottom line, as that code would extend the life of a product that MS seems to have been trying to kill for years.


mmerlinn

"Political correctness is the BADGE of a COWARD!"

 

[baltman]

MS is going to keep the core because they are going to use it in VS and SQL Server. I just hope they use enough of it

Brian

 

[Dan Freeman]

The author of the original article mis-read the press release. Woefully.

I verified this with yag the day that article was released -- the core of the product will NOT be open sourced. There is too much intellectual property in there that is used in other products.

 

[Mike Lewis]

Dan's right. The article is basically rubbish.

It was a similar ill-founded article that started the whole "death of Foxpro" scenario. An article appeared in Information Week, in January 1996, asserting that Microsoft was planning to "abandon the XBase market", give up development of VFP, and somehow combine FoxPro with Visual Basic.

As with the article mentioned in this thread, the author of the Information Week article had mis-interpreted a Microsoft press release, which had simply said that FoxPro would no longer follow the XBase standard, which is a far cry from abandoning the product completely.

Unfortunately, Microsoft did not refute the article, other publications picked it up, and it quickly became an established fact that "Foxpro is dead".

No doubt the same thing will happen this time round.

Mike




__________________________________
Mike Lewis (Edinburgh, Scotland)

My Visual FoxPro site: www.ml-consult.co.uk