FoxPro was a

text-based In computing, text-based user interfaces (TUI) (alternately terminal user interfaces, to reflect a dependence upon the properties of computer terminals and not just text), is a retronym describing a type of user interface (UI) common as an ear ...

programming language A programming language is a system of notation for writing computer programs. Most programming languages are text-based formal languages, but they may also be graphical. They are a kind of computer language. The description of a programming ...

and

database management system In computing, a database is an organized collection of data stored and accessed electronically. Small databases can be stored on a file system, while large databases are hosted on computer clusters or cloud storage. The design of databases span ...

(DBMS), and it was also an

object-oriented Object-oriented programming (OOP) is a programming paradigm based on the concept of "objects", which can contain data and code. The data is in the form of fields (often known as attributes or ''properties''), and the code is in the form of pro ...

programming language, originally published by Fox Software and later by

Microsoft Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational technology corporation producing computer software, consumer electronics, personal computers, and related services headquartered at the Microsoft Redmond campus located in Redmond, Washing ...

, for

MS-DOS MS-DOS ( ; acronym for Microsoft Disk Operating System, also known as Microsoft DOS) is an operating system for x86-based personal computers mostly developed by Microsoft. Collectively, MS-DOS, its rebranding as IBM PC DOS, and a few ope ...

Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

Macintosh The Mac (known as Macintosh until 1999) is a family of personal computers designed and marketed by Apple Inc., Apple Inc. Macs are known for their ease of use and minimalist designs, and are popular among students, creative professionals, and ...

, and

UNIX Unix (; trademarked as UNIX) is a family of multitasking, multiuser computer operating systems that derive from the original AT&T Unix, whose development started in 1969 at the Bell Labs research center by Ken Thompson, Dennis Ritchie, and ot ...

. The final published release of FoxPro was 2.6. Development continued under the

Visual FoxPro Visual FoxPro is a Microsoft data-centric procedural programming language with object-oriented programming (OOP) features. It was derived from FoxPro (originally known as FoxBASE) which was developed by Fox Software beginning in 1984. Fox Techn ...

label, which in turn was discontinued in 2007. FoxPro was derived from FoxBase (Fox Software, Perrysburg, Ohio), which was in turn derived from

dBase dBase (also stylized dBASE) was one of the first database management systems for microcomputers and the most successful in its day. The dBase system includes the core database engine, a query system, a forms engine, and a programming language ...

III ( Ashton-Tate) and dBase II. dBase II was the first commercial version of a database program written by Wayne Ratliff, called Vulcan, running on

CP/M CP/M, originally standing for Control Program/Monitor and later Control Program for Microcomputers, is a mass-market operating system created in 1974 for Intel 8080/ 85-based microcomputers by Gary Kildall of Digital Research, Inc. Initial ...

, as does dBase II. FoxPro was both a DBMS and a

relational database management system A relational database is a (most commonly digital) database based on the relational model of data, as proposed by E. F. Codd in 1970. A system used to maintain relational databases is a relational database management system (RDBMS). Many relatio ...

(RDBMS), since it extensively supported multiple relationships between multiple DBF files (tables). However, it lacked transactional processing. FoxPro was sold and supported by Microsoft after they acquired Fox Software in its entirety in 1992. At that time there was an active worldwide community of FoxPro users and programmers. FoxPro 2.6 for UNIX (FPU26) has even been successfully installed on

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...

and

FreeBSD FreeBSD is a free and open-source Unix-like operating system descended from the Berkeley Software Distribution (BSD), which was based on Research Unix. The first version of FreeBSD was released in 1993. In 2005, FreeBSD was the most popular ...

using the Intel Binary Compatibility Standard ( ibcs2) support library.

Version information

Operating system compatibility

Technical aspects

FoxPro 2 included the "Rushmore" optimizing engine, which used indices to accelerate data retrieval and updating. Rushmore technology examined every data-related statement and looked for filter expressions. If one was used, it looked for an index matching the same expression. FoxPro 2 was originally built on

Watcom C/C++ Watcom C/C++ (currently Open Watcom C/C++) is an integrated development environment (IDE) product from Watcom International Corporation for the C, C++, and Fortran programming languages. Watcom C/C++ was a commercial product until it was discon ...

, which used the DOS/4GW memory extender to access expanded and

extended memory In DOS memory management, extended memory refers to memory above the first megabyte (220 bytes) of address space in an IBM PC or compatible with an 80286 or later processor. The term is mainly used under the DOS and Windows operating systems. DOS ...

. It could also use almost all available RAM even if no

HIMEM.SYS HIMEM.SYS is a DOS device driver which allows DOS programs to store data in extended memory according to the Extended Memory Specification (XMS). The memory beyond the first 1 MB of address space is required by Windows 9x/ Me in order to load ...

was loaded.

Version timeline

References

External links

History of FoxPro - Timeline

A site devoted to the history of FoxPro
{{xBase Fourth-generation programming languages 1984 software Data-centric programming languages XBase programming language family Procedural programming languages Proprietary database management systems Microsoft development tools Microsoft database software fr:Visual FoxPro