2020 is fast approaching. Yet with nearly ubiquitous access to the Web, and thus (theoretically) to the mail store on the company server as well as personal email whereever it may be stored, most people are still using either their provider's web interface or a third party email client.

We need more functionality, via more devices. After all, we're not just using a full size computer for access. It's our desktop computer (maybe), our notebook, our tablet, and our phone. Maybe our Xbox, our PS2, our Wii. We want access to our email via all of these devices.

Webmail interfaces typically don't work well, if at all, on those devices, due to small screen form factors. And you can forget about using your email client that stores email locally. You want to use Gmail's interface instead because it will allow you to access your email from wherever you are, on whatever device you happen to be using.

This book will show you a variety of ways to use Gmail with your own domain. Many scenarios are covered, ranging from one address on one domain to multiple addresses on multiple domains. In every case, you'll learn how to log into Gmail's interface and send and receive email with your own domain's addresses.

The .DBF file format has been a standard for desktop applications for over 30 years. Pretty much every application can read and write to some sort of .DBF file. Back in the day when it was created, the days of 180 kb floppies, sometime later surpassed by those 1.2 MB 3 1/2 inch disks, and, eventually those monster hard disks that held hundreds of or even a thousand megabytes, the 2 GB limit was not a concern.

The xBase family of tools is an excellent tool for manipulating data, just as a spreadsheet is an excellent tool for manipulating numbers. One use was to import data from other formats, such as text files, and slice and dice it once stored in a .DBF. Over the past decade, though, it's become commonplace to run into data sets in other formats bump up against the 2 GB limit, both due to accumulation of data over decades of use of an application as well as larger and more expansive applications. Often those files are simple text dumps from a large SQL database.

Once they grow larger than two gigabytes, though, dealing with them on a desktop level becomes a problem, since they can't be directly imported into a DBF.

What is needed is an intermediate mechanism that can import a raw text file of any size and then allow the user to slice and dice the data as needed. Enter SQLite.

Visual FoxPro has long been the perfect front end for client-server applications. Featuring a robust programming language, a full-featured IDE, and a powerful object model, rich client development has always been a joy. Inside, a native local data engine, integrated hooks into binding with remote data, and Rushmore technology make VFP your secret weapon when connecting to SQL back-ends.

MySQL is the world's most popular open source SQL database, running on Windows, Linux, and Macintosh platforms. Version 5 incorporates "big-iron" features like stored procedures and transactions.

These features, together with the royalty free runtime model of VFP and the open source licensing of MySQL make client-server applications built with these tools the most powerful and economical combination on the planet.

And this book is the only one that shows you specifically how to install, configure, and connect MySQL and VFP, as well as build a variety of client-server user interfaces with VFP. Together with dozens of discussions of real world problems and potential solutions, you won't find a better guide to MySQL and VFP client-server development.

Just about all my VFP development over the past seven years has been with a SQL backend, and over the past four, that backend has usually been MySQL. This is the book I wish I had when I started with MySQL!

Major Linux distributions such as Red Hat, Mandrake and SuSE, among others, have released mature, full-featured versions suitable for day to day use on an average computer user's day to day computer, including not only a complete operating system but also a Microsoft Office-compatible application suite and a plethora of additional tools available for free download. At the same time, more and more people are become frustrated with Microsoft's continuing security problems and privacy, licensing and pricing issues. As a result, Linux is going to make serious inroads on the desktop in 2003 and beyond.

But today's experienced computer user doesn't have time to set up and learn a new operating system and programs alone. This book shows an ordinary computer user who is comfortable with using Microsoft Windows and associated popular applications how Linux works and how using it is similar in many ways to their current software.

Then it guides them through the wonderful world of popular Linux applications that perform the same day to day functions they're used to on their Windows computer - word processing, spreadsheets, presentations, graphics processing, email, Internet browsing, pictures, music and video, and more.

Also included are chapters on file compatibility, how to use Windows programs on a Linux computer, with and without a Windows license, and, for those a bit more technically adept or curious, how things work "under the hood".

Web Connection is an incredible product, enabling you to build high performance, feature-rich, database-enabled websites using the language you know and love - Visual FoxPro. But, as more than one developer has said, "it's a bitch to learn."

This book is your personal tutor, walking you through the plumbing of the Internet and the World Wide Web, showing you how to build your first VFP-based web site step by step, and then how to add features and improve your productivity by exploiting the multitude of built-in classes that Web Connection offers. A must-read for every Web Connection developer!

There are plenty of books that show you how to write applications in a specific language. They do a marvelous job of explaining the nuts and bolts of the syntax and the use of the tools to build applications with the latest features and functionality available. There are also a number of fine books that show you how to be "a computer consultant."

But there are a whole host of issues specific to the business of writing, delivering and supporting custom software systems. The Software Developer?s Guide, Third Edition, is the only book that will take you on a step-by-step tour of the entire process. ?DevGuide 3?, with over 150 pages of new material, shows you how to do "The Other 90%" of the work involved in producing custom software applications.

Whether you're completely new to Visual FoxPro, an old hand with FoxPro 2.x but new to the Visual world, or comfortable with VFP 3.0/5.0 but needing to know what's new in "Tahoe", The Fundamentals has the information you need to build LAN, Client/Server and multi-tier distributed Visual Studio applications on a Visual FoxPro foundation.

The sequel to Whil?s "Programming VFP 3.0," this volume covers the basics of developing a wide range of applications quickly, covers all of the new commands, functions, features and tools of Visual FoxPro 6.0, and then describes, step-by-step, how to build a variety of applications with VFP as the foundation. Required reading for everyone opening up the box.

Now out of print, available as an e-book (PDF).

The second edition of The Software Developer's Guide.

Now out of print.

The original edition of The Software Developer's Guide.

Now out of print.

Boasting a Windows interface, floating toolbars, object-oriented programming and enhanced connectivity, FoxPro has never been so powerful. Programming VFP 3.0 helps you harness this development power and quickly create your own fast, flexible, robust database applications. You won't find a better route to get up to speed on developing Visual FoxPro applications. Using tons of real world Xbase examples, source code, concepts and strategies, development expert and author Whil Hentzen equips you with all the information you need to...

• Understand the elaborate history and fundamentals of the Xbase development paradigm
• Master FoxPro's powerful tools
• Manipulate and query Xbase data strctures using FoxPro's convenient interface
• Understand difficult object-orietned programming concepts and confusing terms
• Create and use object hierarchies, and design and build whole class libraries
• Quickly build new application framework and generic class libraries
• Integrate your FoxPro applications into your network, including multiuser considerations, client/server connectivity, distribution issues and much more.

Now out of print, superceeded by The Fundamentals.

Develop robust database applications with Access 2000 - the most popular desktop database program in use today. Access 2000 Porgramming from the Ground Up first explains basic Access programming methods and tools, icluding queries, forms, reports and VBA techniques. Next, you'll get full details on setting up an Access application structure and using a foundation library. Then it's on to advanced foundation techniques, including security, error handling, and maintenance. Plus, you'll find ways to extend Access' capabilities with data access mechanisms, ActiveX controls, and the Windows API. By the time you're done with this step by step guide, you'll be an Access expert!

The Pros Talk Microsoft Visual FoxPro 3 gives you key insights into using Visual FoxPro 3 to develop state-of-the-art, high performance, low-maintenance database applications. The four authors whose reports this book comprises are highly skilled developers with special expertise in their subject areas.

• Visual FoxPro Data Dictionary, by Doug Hennig, explains how the data dictionary built into Visual FoxPro 3 gives you a way to describe and manage the data elements that make up an application - file names, field names, types, sizes, and index expressions - so you can use them to build data-driven applications.
• Developing Client/Server Applications, by Robert Green, explains why you need client/server applications and discusses the additional components required for them.
• The Visual FoxPro Form Designer, by Stephen A. Sawyer, provides a detailed explanation of the Visual FoxPro Form Desginer, Forms, and controls.
• Object-Oriented Programming with Visual FoxPro, by David Frankenbach, tells you all about objects - what they are, why you need them, how to create them, and how to use them.

Now out of print.

Learn to build robust, extendable FoxPro 2.6 applications for both DOS and Windows with the techniques described in this easily digestible guide to Rapid Application Development. Start with a customized Development Environment and Conventions, move on to Architecture, build a Core Foundation, a Reusable Object Library, and Object Foundations, and finally take advantage of the leverage of Third-Party Products.

Now out of print.