The Beginning Your Program topics in the Visual C++ Programmer’s Guide cover ways to begin writing Windows programs in C++ using Microsoft Wizards, the Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) and the Active Template Library (ATL). Wizards, like the MFC AppWizard, the MFC ActiveX ControlWizard, the ISAPI Extension Wizard, and the ATL COM AppWizard help you generate the basic source files for a variety of different types of Windows programs. The MFC and ATL libraries provide prewritten classes, as well as supporting code, that you can add to your source files to handle the Windows programming tasks specific to the logic of your program.
Using Wizards and the MFC and ATL libraries, you benefit not only from the pre-written code they provide, but also from the pre-generated source code that uses calls to the MFC and the ATL and handles many routine programming tasks. You can, of course, write a program without using a Wizard, but the Wizards save you so much time it doesn’t make sense not to use them.
These topics also cover ways to begin writing Windows programs in C or C++, using calls to the Win32 API rather than to MFC classes. Wizards aren’t available for these older style programs but Visual C++ still helps you get going by providing some starter files for your program.
The following general and more specific topics provide links to overview information that will help you begin your Visual C++ program.
These topics describe the types of programs you can create, how to organize your Visual C++ program into a project in a workspace, and how to use the Visual C++ Wizards.
These topics contain overview information about creating specific types of programs.