GUI Development With C++ In A Windows Environment [closed]

Answer 1

Okay, there are two pieces to this.

The first one is that under Windows, you're going to need a Windows GUI library. You can write to the Windows API in several ways, but the simplest is to use Microsoft's own. That means picking up Visual Studio in some incarnation.

QT, Wx, and otehrs are all utility libraries built on top of the basic Windows API. They're good for portability to other platforms, but they necessarily add some complexity.

For C++, you need a compiler. Again, for Windows, the simplest thing is to use Visual Studio, but there are other compilers available. The most common free one is going to be the GNU compilers. The easy way to get those is with Cygwin, but that is a UNIX-like environment.

I think the conclusion is that for a beginner, you're best off with Visual Studio.

Once you get it, there are many tutorial around on the web and at Microsoft to learn to use it.

Answer 2

Dev C++ is no longer under active development (and is a bit naff anyway). If you want an open source IDE which supports Windows GUI development, try Code::Blocks.

Answer 3

Visual Studio 2008 + WTL would be a great combination if you're not worried about cross-platform support. Qt looks great, but for a simple app it might be overkill - distributing a Qt app means shipping a bunch of DLLs for example, whereas you have fewer dependencies with WTL.

Just my 2c. I don't want to start any flame wars here. :)

Wikipedia

Brilliant series of WTL articles at The Code Project

Answer 4

While possible to use your current IDE and a toolkit like Qt, if you are looking for the path of least resistence, you should go with Visual Studio. You'll find the best documentation and the most support going that route. Check out the Express Edition which is free (as in beer). Then go grab a copy of a good book on the subject like Charles Petzold's Programming Windows. You should be all set.

Answer 5

You have a lot of options and you could use a lot of tools as described by Charlie Martin. I think that if you want the easiest path, you should use wxDev-C++ which is Dev-C++ bundled with the wxWidgets GUI library. After you install it, you can directly develop GUI applications without need for extra configuration. Maybe Dev-c++ is an old IDE, but you already use it and you know it. And wxWidgets is a solid GUI library.

Answer 6

I use Ultimate++ http://ultimatepp.org/ for cross platform C++ GUI development. It also has a complete library of utilities for networking, databases, etc and a really good IDE. It's BSD licensed, so no issues doing what you want with it. It has really good community support as well.