====================================== FoxPro Developers Network of San Diego ====================================== FoxDev TipsLetter #05-01 January 12, 2005 Website: Editor: ---------------------------------------------------------------------- CONTENTS: * Calendar * From the Editor * Tech Tips: VFP Report Listeners Ed Leafe FoxUnit - a Unit Test Framework * Other Stuff: VFP9 Released Ken Levy Joel on Pricing Dan Covill Joel's Advice to CS Students Twas The Night Before Crisis * Knowledge Base Updates New/Updated KB articles on VFP * Links: Where Can I Find...? * Administrivia ====================================================================== CALENDAR: Thu Jan 13 - Marcia Akins and Andy Kramek ------------------------------------------------------------------ Graphs in VFP and Advanced SQL queries (new VFP 9 enhancements) Thu Feb 10 - David Stevenson --------------------------------------------------- (Topic to be announced) Thu March 10 - Dan Covill ------------------------------------- Marketing Yourself as a Consultant Thu April 7 - Mike Feltman -------------------------------------------- An intro to Active FoxPro Pages (AFP), a web development tool, and how to use Visual FoxPro Express with AFP. *** NOTE THE APRIL MEETING IS ONE WEEK EARLIER THAN USUSAL *** May 12 - Doug Hennig ---------------------------------------------- (Topic to be announced) All meetings start at 6:30 pm. Back room of Murphy Canyon Sizzler: 3755 Murphy Canyon Rd Take I-15 to the Aero Dr exit (South of Balboa) Head west to first light west of freeway Turn right Sizzler is on the right almost immediately PLEASE TRY TO COME EARLY ENOUGH TO ORDER YOUR DINNER BEFORE 6:30! We'll have our Q&A session while we eat. ====================================================================== FROM THE EDITOR ====================================================================== Monthly newsletter? This started out as a monthly newsletter, but I'd have to agree it hasn't been very "monthly" of late. Frankly, I don't see that changing any time soon. The problem has two roots. One, the editor is one of the world's great procrastinators, and two, there's a great shortage of material. You could work on #1, I suppose, but my wife has been trying for 50 years now without a whole lot of success, so I kind of doubt you'd get very far. The solution to #2 is as close as your keyboard. Write up your latest insight, discovery, or concern and send it to me. Changing of the Guard Thad V'Soske has left us for the greener pastures of Colorado. Pete Rios is his replacement on our Board of Directors. Dan Covill dcovill@san.rr.com ====================================================================== TECH TIPS ====================================================================== VFP9 RELEASED by Ken Levy The Visual FoxPro Team at Microsoft is very excited to announce the completion and release of Visual FoxPro 9.0! News for December from the VFP Team - Get the latest information about the release and availability of Visual FoxPro 9.0. There won't be any changes or additions to the VFP Developer Center web site here until the first week of January after the holidays. More news, announcements, and press information about the release of Visual FoxPro 9.0 will occur in early January 2005. Stay tuned here for additional VFP 9.0 news and information before then. Ken Levy http://msdn.microsoft.com/vfoxpro [It's "released", but you can't buy it yet. MSDN subscribers can download it, but regular retail availability isn't until February. You can pre-order (at $313.26 for the upgrade) from Jim Eddins' www.foxtoolbox.com As of today (1/12) there is no new information on the website. DC] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- VFP REPORT LISTENERS by Ed Leafe Thanks to a great suggestion by Bill Anderson, I'm pleased to announce the opening of Report Listener Headquarters, at http://reportlistener.com. This is a site dedicated to the sharing of the new Report Listener classes that help make the Report Writer in VFP 9 a truly awesome tool! Modeled after the Taskpane Central site, Report Listener HQ exists to help the VFP community share their creations with each other. You can upload your own cool custom report listener classes, or download other people's classes to either use in your projects, or to simply study to learn more about how these new classes work. Ed Leafe ed@leafe.com [The site already contains submissions by Doug Hennig and Garret Fitzgerald, so it's well worth checking out. DC] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- FOXUNIT FoxUnit is an open-source unit testing framework for Microsoft Visual FoxPro initially sponsored by Visionpace (formerly Vision Data Solutions) and based on the Kent Beck book, "Test Driven Development by Example". Current information and free downloads are available at If you haven't read Beck's book, you can get a better idea of what this is all about from "FoxUnit deals with exclusively with unit tests. Other types of testing such as Integration and acceptance require more automated tools. Test driven development however stresses the importance of unit testing, the purpose to test each class completely so you can feel confident it performs its purpose properly. This is supposed to improve code readability and testability. Unit testing also improves the overall quality of the code, eliminating problems early in the development cycle, saving time and effort down the road. There are a few basic tenets of TDD unit testing: 1. You must write unit tests. (big surprise there!) 2. Don't write any code without writing a test for it first. This ensures you know what's supposed to happen before you write the code. 3. Automate tests so they can repeat frequently. 4. Use mock objects (fake objects) to implement just enough functionality to test objects that interact with each other. FoxUnit is designed to help you accomplish #3, which is the most difficult part." [Actually, that #2 is the one that hit me between the eyes. The idea of deciding exactly what's supposed to happen BEFORE you write the code is kind of, uh..., revolutionary. I'd like to hear from anyone who tries this out. DC] ====================================================================== OTHER STUFF ====================================================================== JOEL ON PRICING by Dan Covill Joel Spolsky (Joel on Software) has written a long piece on software pricing, titled "Camels and Rubber Duckies". There's a discussion on the theory of pricing, with examples of popular current strategies. And then he explains why they don't work! I like it because he takes on several of my pet marketing peeves, and ends up advocating a revolutionary approach - honesty! Here's an example, on "Market Segmentation": ----------------- "In the world of software, you can just make a version of your product called "Professional" and another version called "Home" with some inconsequential differences, and hope that the corporate purchasers (again, the people who are not spending their own money) will be too embarassed at the thought of using "Windows XP Home Edition" at work and they'll buy the Pro edition. Home Edition at work? Somehow that feels like coming to work in your pyjamas! Ick!" ----------------- Here's his take on websites without price information: ----------------- "This is the kind used by software startups founded by ex-Oracle salesmen where the price isn't on the website anywhere. No matter how much you search to find the price, all you get is a form to provide your name, address, phone number, and fax number, for some reason, not that they're ever going to fax you anything. It's pretty obvious here that the plan is to have a salesman call you up and figure out how much you're worth, and then charge you that much. Perfect segmentation! This doesn't work so good either. First of all, the low end buyers are just going to move on. They will assume that if the price isn't listed, they can't afford it. Second, the people who don't like salesmen harassing them will just move on." ----------------- Yeah, it's a bit long, but it's entertaining as well and has some good lessons in it. Recommended. Dan Covill ---------------------------------------------------------------------- JOEL'S ADVICE TO CS STUDENTS "Without further ado, then, here are Joel's Seven Pieces of Free Advice for Computer Science College Students (worth what you paid for them): 1. Learn how to write before graduating. 2. Learn C before graduating. 3. Learn microeconomics before graduating. 4. Don't blow off non-CS classes just because they're boring. 5. Take programming-intensive courses. 6. Stop worrying about all the jobs going to India. 7. No matter what you do, get a good summer internship." ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 'TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE CRISIS [This is the last stanza of a parody that's been around a while.] The system was finished, the tests were concluded, The client's last changes were even included! And the client exclaimed with a snarl and a taunt, "It's just what I asked for, but NOT what I want..." [ DC] ====================================================================== VFP KNOWLEDGE BASE UPDATES ====================================================================== (None received since October.) How To Look Up These Articles: To get to a specific KB article: a. Go to support.microsoft.com. b. Click on "Knowledge Base Article ID Number Search" c. Enter the document number in the page that appears. d. Click on the green arrow. To Subscribe: Subscribe at . You can specify any MS product to receive alerts on. ====================================================================== LINKS ====================================================================== This is a (semi) permanent list of places to look for technical help when you get blind-sided by the latest urgent requirement. We don't give specific URLs for MSDN articles because (a) they're too long and (b) they change too often! ------------------------------- MSDN ON LINE: There's a ton of stuff here, look at the MSDN Magazine. Heavy on .NET, you'll have to dig to find the VFP stuff. ADO VFP and ADO - Part 1 of 2 FoxPro 2.6 procedure library: http://members.aol.com/FoxProResources/fpfp.htm ODBC: MSDN Library: "Using Visual FoxPro to Access Remote Data" ODBC drivers are part of MDAC - Microsoft Data Access Components - and are available for download at: "www.microsoft.com/data" VFP Publications: www.advisor.com FoxPro Advisor www.pinpub.com FoxTalk magazine www.hentzenwerke.com Hentzen Publishing (Books, discussion, and downloads) VFP Run-Times: FTP library with complete VFP run-times from 3 thru 8. VFP General: msdn.microsoft.com/vfoxpro Microsoft's official VFP home page www.foxcentral.net Joint effort by Microsoft, West-Wind, and the Universal Thread Lots of news and development info. The History of FoxPro (submitted by Steve Settimi) www.foxprohistory.org The Universal Thread http://www.universalthread.com The "Wiki" fox.wikis.com fox.wikis.com/wc.dll?Wiki~FoxForumWiki fox.wikis.com/wc.dll?Wiki~VisualFoxProLinks Here's another extensive set of FoxPro links: http://www.cetus-links.org/oo_visual_foxpro.html Private websites with useful free info and downloads: www.prolib.de/foxlinks.afp wOOdy Wondzinski www.gatwicksoftware.com Allen Pollard www.ukfug.org.uk British user group www.lafox.org LA user group www.pinter.com/ Les Pinter www.vfug.org/ Virtual Fox User Group www.leafe.com Ed Leafe, ProFox listserve www.jamesbooth.com white papers and tutorials www.foxforum.com www.foxite.com (registration required) A group of Dutch developers - refreshingly geeky. (Don't be put off by the registration - they're not selling anything.) www.stevenblack.com INTL Toolkit and lots more www.craigberntson.com the Crystal Reports guru WEB Development: These products all work well with VFP. AFP www.afpweb.com and www.afpages.com DotFox www.elsoftware.com FoxWeb www.foxweb.com Web Connection www.west-wind.com X-WORKS www.x-works.com Windows General Win32 API (with VFP examples) [Contributions solicited. DC] --------------------------Administrivia------------------------------- This newsletter is a service to all FoxPro developers, provided without charge by the FoxPro Developers Network of San Diego (FPDN). Anyone may subscribe (or unsubscribe) at our web site . The link is on the home page. The Resources button on the website will take you to the back issues of the newsletter. The editor (Dan Covill) is solely responsible for the content. E-mail him with YOUR tips, comments, or complaints. Editor: Dan Covill 858-272-2448 dcovill@san.rr.com Board of Directors: Eric Lendvai - President 760-734-4929 eric@elsoftware.com Art Bergquist - Vice Pres 760-740-0428 abergquist@sbcglobal.net Barbara Peisch - Treasurer 760-729-9607 barbara@peisch.com Claude Nikula - Secretary 619-615-6318 crndev@verizon.net Dan Covill - Director 858-272-2448 dcovill@san.rr.com Pete Rios - Director prios@eltoroexport.com ----------------------------------------------------------------------