Ivor Horton’s Beginning Visual C++® 2012
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Copyright © 2012 by Ivor Horton
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This book is for my dear wife, Eve, who for so many years has given me unconditional support and love in whatever I choose to do. I could not have written this without her.
IVOR HORTON graduated as a mathematician and was lured into information technology by promises of great rewards for very little work. In spite of the reality usually being a great deal of work for relatively modest rewards, he has continued to work with computers to the present day. He has been engaged at various times in programming, systems design, consultancy, and the management and implementation of projects of considerable complexity.
Horton has many years of experience in the design and implementation of computer systems applied to engineering design and manufacturing operations in a variety of industries. He has considerable experience in developing occasionally useful applications in a wide variety of programming languages, and in teaching primarily scientists and engineers to do likewise. He has been writing books on programming for many years, and his currently published works include tutorials on C, C++, and Java. At the present time, when he is not writing programming books or providing advice to others, he spends his time fishing, traveling, and enjoying life in general.
MARC GREGOIRE is a software engineer from Belgium. He graduated from the Catholic University of Leuven, Belgium, with a degree in “Burgerlijk ingenieur in de computer wetenschappen” (equivalent to master of science in engineering in computer science). The year after, he received the cum laude degree of master in artificial intelligence at the same university. After his studies, Marc started working for a big software consultancy company called Ordina Belgium. As a consultant, he worked for Siemens and Nokia Siemens Networks on critical 2G and 3G software running on Solaris for big telecom operators. This required working in international teams stretching from South America and USA to EMEA and Asia. Now, Marc is working for Nikon Metrology on 3D scanning software.
His main expertise is C/C++, and specifically Microsoft VC++ and the MFC framework. Next to C/C++, Marc also likes C# and uses PHP for creating web pages. In addition to his main interest for Windows development, he also has experience in developing C++ programs running 24/7 on Linux platforms; for example, EIB home automation-controlling and monitoring software.
Since April 2007, he received the yearly Microsoft MVP (Most Valuable Professional) award for his Visual C++ expertise.
Marc is the founder of the Belgian C++ Users Group (www.becpp.org) and an active member on the CodeGuru forum (as Marc G). He also creates freeware and shareware programs that are distributed through his website at www.nuonsoft.com, and maintains a blog on www.nuonsoft.com/blog/.
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THE AUTHOR IS ONLY ONE MEMBER of the large team of people necessary to get a book into print. I’d like to thank the John Wiley & Sons and Wrox Press editorial and production teams for their help and support throughout.
I would particularly like to thank my technical editor, Marc Gregoire, for doing such a fantastic job of reviewing the text and checking out all the code fragments and examples. He has an uncanny knack for finding my errors, and his many constructive comments and suggestions have undoubtedly made the book a much better tutorial.
WELCOME TO Ivor Horton’s Beginning Visual C++ 2012. With this book, you can become an effective C++ programmer using Microsoft’s latest application-development system, Visual Studio 2012. I aim to teach you the C++ programming language, and then how to apply C++ in the development of your own Windows applications. Along the way, you will also learn about many of the exciting new capabilities introduced by this latest version of Visual C++.
Visual C++ 2012 comes as part of any of the editions of the Microsoft development environment Visual Studio 2012. When I refer to Visual C++ in the rest of the book, I mean the Visual C++ 2012 capability that comes as part of Visual Studio 2012.
This book is for anyone who wants to learn how to write C++ applications for the Microsoft Windows operating system using Visual C++. I make no assumptions about prior knowledge of any particular programming language, so there are no prerequisites other than some aptitude for programming and sufficient enthusiasm and commitment for learning to program in C++ to make it through this book. This tutorial is for you if:
The first part of the book teaches you the essentials of C++ programming using the C++ language supported by Visual Studio 2012 through a detailed, step-by-step tutorial. You’ll learn the syntax and use of the ISO/IEC C++ language and gain experience and confidence in applying it in a practical context through an extensive range of working examples. There are also exercises that you can use to test your knowledge, with solutions available for download if you get stuck.
Of course, the language tutorial also introduces and demonstrates the use of the C++ standard library facilities you are most likely to need. You’ll add to your knowledge of the standard libraries incrementally as you progress through the C++ language. Additionally, you will learn about the powerful tools provided by the Standard Template Library (STL).
Once you are confident in applying C++, you move on to Windows programming. You will learn how to develop Windows applications using the Microsoft Foundation Classes (MFC) by creating a substantial working application of more than 2000 lines of code. You develop the application over several chapters, utilizing a broad range of user interface capabilities provided by the MFC. You also learn the essentials of programming applications using the Windows 8 UI and develop a working example.
The book is structured as follows:
All chapters in the book include working examples that demonstrate the programming techniques discussed. Every chapter concludes with a summary of the key points that were covered, and most chapters include a set of exercises at the end that you can attempt, to apply what you have learned. Solutions to the exercises, together with all the code from the book, are available for download from the publisher’s website.
There are several versions of Visual Studio 2012 and they each have a different range of capabilities. You can only develop applications using the Windows 8 UI if you have Visual Studio 2012 installed with Windows 8. Here’s what you can use to work with various parts of the book:
There is a free Visual Studio 2012 Express Edition for Windows 8, which is not sufficient to run many of the examples in the book. None of the examples in Chapters 12 to 17 can be compiled with the Visual Studio 2012 Express Edition.
To help you get the most from the text and keep track of what’s happening, we’ve used a number of conventions throughout the book.
As for styles in the text:
persistence.properties.
We use a monofont type with no highlighting for most code examples.
We use bold highlighting to emphasize code that is of particular importance in the present context.
As you work through the examples in this book, you may choose either to type in all the code manually, or to use the source code files that accompany the book. The code downloads for the complete examples in the book are located at www.wrox.com/remtitle.cgi?isbn=9781118368084 on the Download Code tab.
Once you download the code, just decompress it with your favorite compression tool. Alternately, you can go to the main Wrox code download page at www.wrox.com/dynamic/books/download.aspx to see the code available for this book and all other Wrox books.
Many of the chapters have a set of exercises for you to test your knowledge. I encourage you to try all of these. If you get stuck you can download solutions to all of these exercises from www.wrox.com/remtitle.cgi?isbn=9781118368084.
We make every effort to ensure that there are no errors in the text or in the code. However, no one is perfect, and mistakes do occur. If you find an error in one of our books, like a spelling mistake or faulty piece of code, we would be very grateful for your feedback. By sending in errata, you may save another reader hours of frustration, and at the same time, you will be helping us provide even higher quality information.
To find the errata page for this book, go to http://www.wrox.com and locate the title using the Search box or one of the title lists. Then, on the book’s detail page, click the Book Errata link. On this page, you can view all errata that has been submitted for this book and posted by Wrox editors. A complete book list, including links to each book’s errata, is also available at www.wrox.com/misc-pages/booklist.shtml.
If you don’t spot “your” error on the Book Errata page, go to www.wrox.com/contact/techsupport.shtml and complete the form there to send us the error you have found. We’ll check the information and, if appropriate, post a message to the book’s errata page and fix the problem in subsequent editions of the book.
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At http://p2p.wrox.com, you will find a number of different forums that will help you, not only as you read this book, but also as you develop your own applications. To join the forums, just follow these steps:
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