The stages in the development process are outlined here and briefly discussed within the context of Visual C++ and the development environment. They include:
Each programmer may approach any given stage at a different time or in a different order; no preferred order is implied.
Usually, you can use AppWizard to generate a robust set of application “starter” files. Within AppWizard, you specify the structure you’d like your application to take, and the options and features you’d like AppWizard to provide.
You can use AppWizard to generate the following types of MFC projects:
The Circle Tutorial demonstrates building an ActiveX control.
You can create many non-MFC project types:
Once you’ve chosen your project type, you’ll choose the application type. AppWizard provides the following types to choose from, with MDI being selected as the default.
The Enroll Tutorial is an SDI-based application.
The Scribble Tutorial demonstrates creating a simple MDI application.
After choosing a basic project and application type, your choices become more specific. AppWizard provides branching options you can use in various combinations to create the basis for sophisticated applications. For example, based on your specifications, AppWizard will generate MFC code for any of the following features:
The Enroll Tutorial demonstrates building a simple database application with ODBC support. The DaoEnrol Tutorial demonstrates the Enroll application using the DAO classes.
Scribble Step 7 demonstrates adding OLE server support to Scribble. The OLE Container Tutorial demonstrates building an OLE container application.
The AutoClik Tutorial demonstrates building an Automation server.
The Circle Tutorial demonstrates building an ActiveX control.
Scribble Step 6 is a complete tour of providing context-sensitive Help for your Visual C++ applications.
If the options presented by AppWizard aren’t as tailored to your needs as you’d like, you can design a custom AppWizard that generates a set of starter project files. With a custom AppWizard, you can specify the basis for the application according to your needs, your company’s particular data sources, and so forth. Every time you run this custom AppWizard, it generates the starter files according to those specifications.