csammisrun

Back in 2002 / 2003, before I got addicted to C#, I was very much into Win32 API programming in C, using Visual Studio 6. Also back in the day, I wrote a tutorial on API programming, since the material I used to teach myself was pretty sparse and generally no good. I haven’t done API programming in ages, but ever since my old website went offline, I’ve gotten a few requests for the guide to return. Here it is!

Win32 GUI programming

A tutorial that hopefully does good instead of evil

Inspired by a friend who suggested I take my experience and write it down, here’s my tutorial on programming using the Windows API. Feedback, comments, suggestions, send to csammis@cs.iastate.edu.

• Part One – The Big Picture
  • Introduction – Many questions, some instructions
    • What is this tutorial?
    • Who did I write it for?
    • For that matter, why did I write it?
    • What you need to play with the examples
    • A note on terminology
  • Chapter One – Using Visual Studio and MSDN
    • Creating a project
    • Looking up entries in MSDN
  • Chapter Two – What’s different about a GUI program?
  • The start
  • The middle
  • The end
  • Chapter Three – Getting a handle on Windows
    • Handles
    • Messages and the message loop
    • Window Procedures
    • Window Classes
• Part Two – Take that, Notepad!
  • Chapter Four – Creating the first window
    • Starting things off
    • Initializing a GUI application
    • Creating the initial window
    • Adding in the window procedure and message loop
    • Build…and what’s wrong with it??
    • Summary
  • Chapter Five – All about controls
    • Concerning controls
    • Designing JotStuffDownPad
  • Chapter Six – Taking control
    • Starting off
    • Adding in BuildControls()
    • Build, and gaze upon the wonder!
    • Summary
  • Chapter Seven – Putting something under the hood
    • Processing messages from controls
    • The “Exit” button
    • The “New” button
    • The “Delete” button
    • The “Save” button
    • Processing the combo box
    • Fixin’ some “features”
    • Summary
  • Chapter Eight – Making JotStuffDownPad look purdy
    • Setting fonts
    • Doing the “Dance of the Resizing Window”
    • Introducing the resource file
    • Adding a personal touch with icons
    • Summary
• All good things…
  • Appendix A – Working with QTam Bitmap to Icon
  • Glossary
  • Terms
  • API functions