The library’s classes are presented here in the following categories:
The section General Class Design Philosophy explains how the Microsoft Foundation Class Library was designed.
The framework is explained in detail in the Visual C++ Programmer's Guide. (See Using the Classes to Write Applications for Windows, for an overview.) Some of the classes listed above are general-purpose classes that can be used outside of the framework.and provide useful abstractions such as collections, exceptions, files, and strings.
To see the inheritance of a class, use the Class Hierarchy Chart.
In addition to the classes listed in this overview, the Microsoft Foundation Class Library contains a number of global functions, global variables, and macros. There is an overview and detailed listing of these in the section MFC Macros and Globals, which follows the alphabetical reference to the MFC classes.