There are many functions available in Windows API for usage, is there any book which would act as a comprehensive reference for the APIs available in windows? I mean the books i have been reading give a basic idea of there usage. I would need something comprehensive, like we have The Standard C library by Plauger. I need something like a manual (appropriately) or a book (preferably) which would divide the Windows APIs on basis of its features,etc and give the names of available functions.
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A:
Altough a bit old, Programming Windows by Charles Petzold is the bible of the Windows API. The last edition covers up to Windows 98 and NT 4.0. However it's C only.
To program in C++ with the API, you can build up your own framework, use MFC or, as I would recommend, use Qt, where you can mix API and Qt programming freely, depending on what portability to other platforms you want to achieve.
The online reference of the WinAPI is in MSDN, here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ee663300(v=VS.85).aspx
Hernán
2010-08-03 18:12:30
Petzold is very good. MFC hides a lot of the details of low level windows programming. The only drawbacks to using Qt or MFC are that it takes a while to learn to use them effectively.
Jay
2010-08-03 18:23:23
A:
That would be one hell of a big book - the Windows API is huge, and the C Standard library is tiny in comparison. Is there some reason that MSDN does not work for you?
anon
2010-08-03 18:22:59
Well i know about MSDN but at times my internet doesnt work.Is there a way to download these docs as a local copy?
strut
2010-08-03 18:41:52
@strut Well, Visual C++ used to come with the complete thing on CD, but I haven't used VC++ for some time, so I don't know if it still does.
anon
2010-08-03 18:43:36