The Organization of This Book

As the table of contents shows, this book has six parts and an appendix section.

Part I: Windows, Visual C++, and Application Framework Fundamentals

In this part, we try to strike a balance between abstract theory and practical application. After a quick review of Win32 and the Visual C++ components, you'll be introduced, in a gentle way, to the MFC application framework and the document-view architecture. You'll look at a simple "Hello, world!" program, built with the MFC library classes, that requires only 30 lines of code.

Part II: The MFC Library View Class

The MFC library documentation presents all the application framework elements in quick succession, with the assumption that you know the original Windows API. In Part II, you're confined to one major application framework component—the view, which is really a window. You'll learn here what experienced Windows programmers know already, but in the context of C++ and the MFC library classes. You'll use the Visual C++ tools that eliminate much of the coding drudgery that early Windows programmers had to endure.

Part II covers a lot of territory, including graphics programming with bitmaps, dialog data exchange, ActiveX control usage, 32-bit memory management, and multithreaded programming. The exercises will help you to write reasonably sophisticated Windows-based programs, but those programs won't take advantage of the advanced application framework features.

Part III: The Document-View Architecture

This part introduces the real core of application framework programming—the document-view architecture. You'll learn what a document is (something much more general than a word processing document), and you'll see how to connect the document to the view that you studied in Part II. You'll be amazed, once you have written a document class, at how the MFC library simplifies file I/O and printing.

Along the way, you'll learn about command message processing, toolbars and status bars, splitter frames, and context-sensitive help. You'll also be introduced to the Multiple Document Interface (MDI), the current standard for Windows-based applications.

Part III also contains a discussion of dynamic link libraries (DLLs) written with the MFC library. You'll learn the distinction between an extension DLL and a regular DLL. If you're used to Win16 DLLs, you'll notice some changes in the move to Win32.

Part IV: ActiveX: COM, Automation, and OLE

COM by itself deserves more than one book. Part IV will get you started in learning fundamental COM theory from the MFC point of view. You'll progress to Automation, which is the link between C++ and Visual Basic for Applications (VBA). You'll also become familiar with uniform data transfer and structured storage, and you'll learn the basics of compound documents and embedded objects.

Part V: Database Management

Windows-based programs often need access to information in large databases. Visual C++ now supports two separate database management options: Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) and Data Access Objects (DAO). Part V offers a chapter on each option. You'll learn about the extensive MFC and wizard support for both options, and you'll see the differences between and similarities of ODBC and DAO. We'll also cover a new data access technology, OLE/DB, which is supported by ATL OLE/DB consumer and providers.

Part VI: Programming for the Internet

This part starts with a technical Internet tutorial that covers the TCP/IP protocol plus the Winsock and WinInet APIs. You'll learn how to write C++ server and client programs for the Internet and the intranet, you'll learn how to write ISAPI DLLs that extend the Microsoft Internet Information Server, and you'll learn how to program for Dynamic HTML. We've also included coverage on Windows CE in this section.

Appendixes

Appendix A contains a list of message map macros and their corresponding handler function prototypes. ClassWizard usually generates this code for you, but sometimes you must make manual entries.

Appendix B offers a description of the MFC application framework's runtime class information and dynamic creation system. This is independent of the RTTI (runtime type information) feature that is now a part of ANSI C++.



Programming Visual C++
Advanced 3ds max 5 Modeling & Animating
ISBN: 1572318570
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 1997
Pages: 331
Authors: Boris Kulagin

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