We have a large FoxPro application that is basically our core business application that is used by 50 to 100 users on a daily basis. I know very little about FoxPro as I am just the web guy and I am asking for information about multi user implementations. We currently use MS Terminal Services to share this app to our users at our corporate office. So basically each user has a shortcut to a Terminal Services connection on their desktop which remotes them into the main app server so they can log in to this FoxPro app.

.NET framework also provides a large library, Visual Studio IDE, and Microsoft SQL Server. Visual FoxPro's relational database ports well and suits with.

Needless to say the ~100 Terminal Services client licenses we have to maintain is quite expensive. I was wondering why they might have this set up this way, Shouldn't the users be able to access the FoxPro app over a network share? I would think each user could have a shortcut on their desktop pointing to the FoxPro apps.exe file allowing them to run their own instance of the program through the network. Could there be a limitation to how the FP app is built preventing this or could it be on the users desktop not meeting basic requirements? Please help me understand our options for multi user implementations for our FoxPro application.

VFP can be both the front end UI and also provide the backend database with native access. Unity pro serial number generator reviews. When you use VFP tables as backend then it is a file based access, rather than service based and also it is not a client/server connection. File based access means: 1) It needs to access the data files read/write 2) Traffic between the client and server might be high (both depending on how the developers wrote it and also VFP is known to be 'chatty') Being used through TS also means VFP runtime files need not be installed on each computer.

A well designed VFP application doesn't really need terminal services. All it needs is to have the exe + read write access to its data files (if native data is used).

If it is not well designed then it may get slow with this setup. Using under terminal services, data would then be 'local' to the executable and client would only get the screen images. You may try copying the application folder on another computer and then using the data from server giving it read/write rights. If they used something like SQL server as back end then I wouldn't think that they would choose TS (and if total database size is up to 10Gb it would mean that you don't need any SQL server or connection licenses as well). With VFP native back end all you need is really a file server. VFP can be both the front end UI and also provide the backend database with native access.