Good advice for programmers re: languages (Posting: Larry Bradley)

Comes from this thread:

...If you can write apps in VFP, you can write apps in anything...Once you know HOW to write programs, learning a new language and applying it is easy.

VFP is actually a lousy programming language - it doesn't protect you from
yourself, like a lot of modern strongly-typed languages do. It is easy to
shoot yourself (and your client) in the foot, or other more tender parts.
If you are successful with VFP, you should have no problems with Python,
C#, Algol, ... (add language flavor of the month here).

The development environment is a lot more important than the language. ...

Don't get hung up on "I'm a VFP developer". You aren't. You are an
application developer. And you can develop apps in any language that meets
the client's needs. It might take you a while longer than if you did it in
VFP, which we all know like the back of our hands. There is going to be a
learning curve. But you can do it.

But if a client's needs might be best satisfied by using Delphi, why not?
You don't need to be a one-tool application developer. A carpenter would be
in deep doo-doo (sawdust?) if he only had one saw. Put several saws in your
toolbox, and get out there and build things.

Why not use some of your spare time taking a small VFP app that you have
written, and convert it to some other language? Python/DABO? VB and mySQL?
Make it a web-based app, using PHP and Apache and mySQL? C# and SQL Lite?

No need to despair. There will always be more work out there than people to
do it.