The LA Fox Developer Newsletter

August 1995

President’s Column (Con't from page 2)

You should be aware however, that even a week-

long session is not going to teach you everything

you need to be effective. It will introduce you to

concepts, get you over the threshold of absorbing

the massive amount of new information, and teach

you the mechanics of using the new tools much

faster than you can do it yourself. But even after a

long beta test period, these companies haven’t yet

had enough time and experience to establish

mature, proven development techniques that take

full advantage of the new tools. As time passes,

they will offer advanced seminars covering more

design and development techniques, but this soon

after release you are going to get a heavy dose of

concepts and mechanics rather than techniques.

You will need more time on your own to master the

tools - experimenting to establish your own tech-

niques and adapting the tools to the kind of applica-

tions you build and the style of development you

practice. In summary, my opinion is that this kind of

training is far superior to the “developer conference"

approach or the one day "introduction" seminars. It

is the best alternative available and is indispens-

able for a practicing FoxPro developer \emdash

you can’t afford not to do this if yOu make your living

developing applications.

And the VFP books are starting to hit the shelves.

Dick Bard has published already, and others are

dose behind - Alan Gnver and George Goley for

sure. I wish Alan Schwartz would write one - he has

a unique gift for dear communication. We will be

discussing those books at later user meetings, and

written reviews by members will be warmly received

by Barry and published in the newsletter.

Synergy

An exciting idea circulating in the FoxPro community

right now is the’ expected compatibility among three

of the leading third party products in their forthcom-

ing Visual FoxPro versions. The idea is dearly

expressed in recent brochures from Neon Software

regarding plans for their Visual FoxExpress.

FoxExpress is a well respected rapid application

development tool in the 2.6 arena, and it will now be

upgraded to produce object oriented applications

which are based on a foundation of methodologies

and dass hierarchies from the Flash Creative

Management/Alan Gnver Codebook, and will in-

clude a run time version of the Micromega FoxFire

report writer. It will also add capability for team

Announcements

FoxPro Advisor magazine has once again organized

an intensive four day FoxPro Developers Conference.

This years meeting will be held in Phoenix Arizona

from October 22 through 25. This conference will

focus exclusively on FoxPro, with technical sessions

covering the full spectrum of Visual FoxPro and

FoxPro 2.6 topics. The sessions are grouped from

introductory through intermediate and advanced, so

you can be sure of getting information at the level you

need and avoid wasting time with material that is

either over your head or already mastered. The con-

ference is jointly sponsored by Microsoft and many of

the speakers are directly from the development team

in Redmond, including Richard McAniff, the General

Manager of that group. Other speakers include well

known consultants and trainers such as Geor

Goley, Steven Black, and Drew Speedie. Th re are

also four Sunday pre-conference sessions on related

topics such as Windows 95 and OLE Controls. The

price is $795 - relatively low for this type of compre-

hensive con fer ence. You can register at 800- 368-

3204.

Microsoft Roadmap

The Microsoft Roadmap to Developer Products and

Services contains more than 100 files of information to

help you learn about and evaluate Microsoft products

and services. It provides datasheets, strategy papers,

technology specifications, and product demos, which

you can find using the Browser or full text search.

What Do You Need to Run It?

Personal computer using a 386SX-25MHz proces-

sor or higher (33MHz recommended)

MS-DOS®operating system version 5.0 or later

Microsoft® Windows® operating system version

3.1

or later

How Do You Get It?

Come to the next meeting. We’ll have the order forms.

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