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I just had a wonderful experience yesterday that I'd
like to share with the community.
I purchased VPM less than a month ago. With a
small job in hand (< 40 hours estimated using my own previous framework), I decided to
make this project the guinea pig.
Bottom Line: With two hours to delivery time, I
was still coding, but absolutely not worried. After a month of using VPM I
could look at the remaining work and know I'd have an hour to spare. I finished the
project, made the diskettes, and delivered a perfect program, all thanks to VPM.
(Even walked out with a check).
I purchased VPM for one reason only, to save
time. Like most developers, I am a control freak, and tend to believe that my own
efforts are the best. I developed a rather complex framework of my own (before I
knew commercial ones were available, or why I would eventually want one) in 1997.
Like most efforts, once I was finished with it, I began planning its successor. I
spent many hours planning what I hoped would be the most comprehensive and productive
framework around.
But sooner or later I looked at all of those unbillable
hours and asked myself, am I theorist who develops frameworks? or am I a developer
who develops apps?
It was actually bittersweet when VPM arrived.
Reviewing the manual I saw they had written much of my framework, and they even used many
of the same approaches I was going to use. It was a little sad to leave behind the
thrill and challenge of theoretical design work, but one person can't do everything, and
at least I was using a product whose engineers seemed to think the same way I did.
Of course, this meant that I could get up and running
right away, which I did.
Although VPM tooks some getting used to, it was not a
"learning curve" in the conventional sense, but simply a matter of learning
where VPM puts things. I found that VPM focused and magnified my years of experience
with Foxpro and VFP.
This first project that I developed in VPM was a truly
amazing experience. For the first time I was able to spend my time doing nothing
but analysis and programming, absolutely without the "overhead" of debugging my
own framework. As the hours progressed, and I noticed this happening, it felt
wonderful. Here I was at last, worrying about nothing but the customer's app.
The untroubled routine of passing the hours and watching the app develop is something I
will now never give up.
Of course, I can never completely give up some of my
own ideas. I've never liked VFP's dismal report writer, and had developed my own
reporting scheme that allowed me to rarely use it. VPM's dependence on the report
writer meant that I had to import some classes and forms from my own original
framework. This took less than 1 hour, and I had modified the default VPM setup to
include my reporting scheme. Amazing!
VPM is a terrific product. I made back my
investment on the first day of programming. Even without seeing the new built-in
framework in VFP 6.0, I know that Microsoft could never craft something so determined at
every stage to help me as VPM is. If I go to VFP 6.0, I will take VPM with me.
Congratulations on a wonderful product!
Ken Downs
Downs Information Systems, Inc. |
