I am new to Visual Studio 2008 (.NET Framework 3.5) and am Developing a Windows Form application.
Starting the IDE, the only options for a New Project are under the categories:
- Visual Basic
- Visual C#
- Visual C++
I did Visual C++ -> CLR -> Windows Forms Application
However, the template code is in the “Visual C++” syntx.
How do I create a new GUI project with plain vanilla C/C++ using Visual Studio 2008?
Please note, the last time I did this was with MFC in Visual Studio C++ 6.0
If I am missing the underlying principal please explain.
Thank You!
Example: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms235634%28v=vs.90%29.aspx
Long story short – you cannot.
Windows Forms is a .NET framework and not a C++ framework. This in turn means that you cannot use C++ to work with it. What Microsoft did is invented their own language that is C++-ish, but compiles into CLI bytecode (likely with native code mix-in, but I am not sure). Before it was “Managed C++”, now it is C++/CLI (what you have linked as an example is not C++, but C++/CLI).
For plain C++ projects you have to choose “Win32 Project”, “Win32 Console Application” or “Empty Project”.. But then you cannot work with Windows Forms. Your options would be to use other GUI libraries like GTK, Qt, WxWidgets. There are tons of GUI frameworks. Or perhaps you would prefer sticking with Win32 API. My personal choice is Qt. And no Visual Studio at all.
Hope it clarifies things a bit for you. Good luck!