8 replies to this topic

[Chimera]

Hi all,

I learnt console programming many years ago, and have not used it that often, however I am wanting to code programs with a GUI and would like to know how to go abouts it?

Would I simply download the Windows XP SDK and read that or should I brush up on anything else?

Cheers!

[v0id]

You could use the raw Win32 API, but it can be hard, especially for a beginner. I would definitely recommend a widget toolkit, which usually is easier to use. Unfortunately, I haven't really heard about any good toolkits for Windows and C. I would had suggested wxWidgets, but it's only for C++. You could use GTK+, but it's meant for Unix-system (but ported for Windows (and other platforms)), so I don't think it native.

[Chimera]

Thanks for the reply.

I dont mind learning C++ or even C#, Is it rather hard to implement a GUI?

I have done coding in Visual Basic and hoping the GUI generation would be similiar?

[WingedPanther]

If you have a GUI toolkit, it's not too bad. If you're using raw API, it can be a real nightmare.

[dargueta]

I strongly suggest learning API first. Although it is difficult, you'll be able to do so much more with it in the long run. You can use MFC, but it's buggy and can sometimes be a pain to work with. To create your GUI interfaces, I suggest using Visual C++ Express Edition 2008, which you can download for free here.

Beginner's tutorial on Win32 API

[Rothzael]

Yep, you can try manually building a GUI, but in the end you'll need some kind of resource manager and IDE to make anything substantial.

[TkTech]

From the begging, I would advise neither using the raw API unless you plan on doing very extensive graphics, like high speed fractal drawing, or using any library that isn't portable. My personal favorite is JUCE, which provides EVERYTHING for macs, windows, and linux. This includes a very large widget library, a sound encoding/decoding library, with playback and audio recording, eq effects and more, a cross platform networking layer for UDP and TCP as well as raw packets, and more.

Qt and wxWidgets are also good but are mostly just graphics.

[Rothzael]

Note: When learning Windows GUI programming, I found it easier to understand by learning the basics, then upgrading to a specific IDE. I found that theForger's tutorial helped as a starting point.

[v0id]

For a reference on the Win32 API, check MSDN.