Customer Reviews

Internet Applications with Visual FoxPro 6.0

5 star:		(16)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Overall I think that Rick's book is very good. It assumes you are fascile with VFP. I believe that Rick has succeeded (moreso than Microsoft) at enlightening readers how to take advantage of the power that VFP offers for web development. The one drawback to the book is the age-old "moving target" dilemma. Since the book hs been published, Microsoft has delivered a (more) truly multithreaded version of the VFP runtime engine, and it now supports the Compile command in the run time version. This changes the equation a bit when it comes to deciding how to best deploy VFP as a web database server, and I wish Rick would e-publish an addendum that thoroughly addresses this. Regardless, I think the book is still an essential reference. To my knowledge, it's the only one of its kind.

If we (VFPers) wanted to stay competitive in the arena of Software Development, we should be thinking of migrating apps into the Internet. This book is a perfect guide for us to build dynamic WEB Applications. Now, I am little bit at ease because VFP really is a powerful tool and I don't have anymore pressure to look for another just for WEB building.

The clarity in which this book describes emerging technologies is astounding.

It seems to be right on the pulse of internet development and shows in clear examples how things work. But it does not stop there; all the little tricks that make the various products and tools sing in harmony are detailed and the author gives work-arounds and offers best practice rules for us to apply. (I have already tried many of them and they all work just as described!)

It is too bad that the section on XML was written prior to the release of IE5. I could have really used the author to elaborate his keen insight and vision into generating XML/XSL -- but, hey, if I knew yesterday what I know today...

Limited time prevents me from reading too many books, but I highly recommend this one to anyone who is or wants to build really great web applications in Visual Studio.

This book makes the pain of migrating to Visual FoxPro pay off! I've finally found something that Visual FoxPro is better for than good old 2.x. Thank you Rick Strahl! If you are a FoxPro programmer and have a need to display your data on the web this book describes the mechanics to do it. While other internet development books only mention Visual FoxPro in passing, this book fills in the Fox hole! It's a must read for anyone looking for a Fox solution!

This book is a real eye opener. I've been doing Web development for a long time, but this book is full of new and different ideas of how to use the Web that I could put to work immediately. This is definitely not your average Web development book. The standard fare of ASP and FoxISAPI are covered but there are also great sections on client side integration, which points out many not-so-obvious methods for integrating the Web into existing applications. The scalability and Large Web development chapters also offer a number of interesting ideas. Even if you're not a VFP developer this book will be well worth a read. And if you are a VFP developer you'll really appreciate all the tools Rick provides with the book and in the code snippets in the text.

Rick's book takes a Visual FoxPro developer though all of the required technologies involved in building remote and distributed applications over HTTP using Visual FoxPro. The book clearly shows how these core descriptions, tutuorials, and examples are then glued together to allow a Visual FoxPro developer design and develop high powered internet/intranet applications.

Mr. Strahl explains everything you need to know to put your VFP applications on the internet. The INet technologies are not left as some kind of magic, but rather are explained clearly and susinctly. A must have book.

This book is excellent! It provides so much in-depth information on how the Internet works and how to put it to use with VFP. I also appreciated the many little tips and tricks that share the author's obvious knowledge about FoxPro and the Internet. Another strong point is the fact that the author actually mentions downsides and problems and weighs them - this balance is something we see little of in most books these days. The only nit I have is that this book does not serve as a good quick reference - it's meant to be read not used for quick lookups. But a full read is well worth it and the logically grouped chapters are independently readable!

Rick Strahl really knows his stuff and it shows. The chapter om IIS setup helped me understand how to set the Web site server parameters better than I could with any other book or info (MS included!).

This book clearly explains the different ways to create applications that do something useful on the Web. It details ASP, ISAPI and COM with lots of easy to follow Visual FoxPro code examples.

It also discusses at length using VFP as a client and server using HTTP as your network.

I highly recommend this book to anyone serious about database programming on the web or using the internet for your app distribution.

I would like to know how many of these rave reviewers have actually tried to implement the procedures, step-by-step, as outlined in Rick Strahl's book. I spent a miserable two weeks trying to get things to work and discovering numerous mistakes, incorrect syntax, and missing function calls. While the solutions Strahl has developed are very inventive and creative, the logic in the book is often hard to follow, and he jumps into code without telling which whether he's coding web pages, the automated server, or foxpro, or where the code fits into the overall application design. There are many omissions and logical leaps of faith.

Also, the book fails to deliver what it promises. In his introductory discussion, he points out the great advantages of server-side development, because it requires the least of users in terms of the software they have on their computers or which browser they are using. He winds up his demonstration section on server-side development with an actual FoxPro form that runs on the web, but with a magical sleight of hand he almost forgets to tell you that this "requires" Internet Explorer. This is server-side development? I don't think so.

I finally hit enough blind alleys and dead ends that I decided to try something else. I would suggest that Fox developers who are interested in developing web applications point their browsers to Foxweb. They have an excellent, much more efficient product that works on the same technolology, but comes with documentation that is logical and straightforward. It took me about an hour to read and digest the documentation, and we were up and running in no time.