I have a shell extension that uses IThumbnailProvider and IInitializeWithStream interfaces to generate thumbnail previews for the registered file types. It's working great on Windows 7 but it doesn't work on Windows 8.
I've found out that Windows 8 has 2 new related interfaces: IThumbnailCachePrimer and IThumbnailSettings. But the preliminary documentation of Microsoft doesn't explain anything...
Does anybody have some info about how the preview control system has changed in Windows 8?
Ok, actually, the thumbnail processing in Windows 8 Consumer Preview still works with the WinVista/7 API.
It's just that by default Win8 doesn't come with the vc++ runtimes, but only the .net versions of those runtimes...silly error :/
Well, at least now it works in Desktop mode although quite slowly. The poor performance is maybe due to the fact ｍｙ Win8 is still a beta ｒｕｎｎｉｎｇ ｗｉｔｈｉｎ ａ ｖｉｒｔｕａｌ ｍａｃｈｉｎｅ．
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I have a rather large codebase that I've inherited and I'm kind of stuck in the past for the moment. I'm working in Visual C++ 6 in Windows 7 (32-bit), however, I'm targeting an XP machine (Service Pack 2). Corporate doesn't see the ROI of upgrading it to .NET and I've got about as much pull as a Mini Cooper towing a train.
With that said, I did seemingly successfully install VC++6 (without XP compatibility) on my Win7 machine and I can compile and run fine. However, when I try to deploy my release build to my XP machine, it crashes (while it does not crash on Win7). If, however, I build the same code on the XP machine directly, it'll work fine. Running VC++6 on my Win7 machine in XP compatibility mode crashes the IDE upon opening of my workspace.
The only thing I can possibly think of is that the code makes extensive use of ActiveX controls and the registry. I'm not sure if maybe there's some Win7 specific registry modifications that are being made or vice-versa. Then again, I know very little about the registry; I'm definitely much more comfortable working in a Unix environment when coding for pleasure, especially when I code in C/C++.
Here's a screenshot of the error I'm getting when it crashes. I'm imaging it's got something to do with ActiveX registration.
No, this isn't ActiveX related at all. This is you bog-standard, 1980's type assert. As you would have noticed, had you looked at winocc.cpp line 279.
Since the VideoLAN programmers do write Windows 8/RT/Phone apps using Linux based operating systems and GCC I was wondering, whether there is some progress in regard to how to program for Windows in a Linux environment, where Windows is used only for testing. How easy/ hard is it, to program a Windows RT (modern UI whatever)/ Windows Phone 8 application on Linux?
I imagine a situation, where you use tools such as Git, Emacs/ VIM, GCC, Mono etc. to do the job. How about submitting the app without Visual Studio?
I ask, because Microsoft open-sourced so much stuff now, using Linux based OS for development could (should?) become feasible while developing apps for their systems. Does anybody have some behind the scenes information on this? It is very hard to find some relevant info.
Note I edited this question to be more "straight to the point"
Links:
This is the VLC Kickstarter page: https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1061646928/vlc-for-the-new-windows-8-user-experience-metro
I'm a software engineer at Microsoft so I think I could give you some insights on this.
From a testing perspective, you should definitely have a Windows machine to test against. You can install Windows 8 as a VM using Virtual Box or something similar. You could also remote into a Windows machine if you have access to one.
Visual Studio can't be installed in Linux, as you know, but there are other C#/ASP.NET/etc. IDE's that you can use natively on Linux. Look into Wine for Linux: http://www.winehq.org/about/. It may help you somewhat.
As an aside, developing applications for Windows will be getting easier in the coming months. As was announce at MS Build, Microsoft is moving towards a universal app store that will make your app run on all Windows devices: PC, tablet, phone, and Xbox. This doesn't help with developing apps on Linux, but if you're a Windows developer, you might want to keep your eyes open about the new universal-style apps.
I am developing a sidebar gadget for windows 7 using Silverlight in an enterprise company (70K+ employees).
All of our windows 7 client builds are x64, hence all the sidebar processes are running as x64.
Even though I know that there is an option switching to a 32 bit version,
I cannot allow this to myself – people will have to execute registry files, or a GPO will have to be applied, etc…
I have been desperately waiting for Silverlight 5th version since it’s supposed to have a 64 bit runtime.
Now, when sidebar starts the gadget, it says that I am missing Silverlight 5 runtime, suggesting to download it from here:
http://www.microsoft.com/getsilverlight/locale/en-us/html/coming-soon_5.0.0.html
There is a link on this page that leads me back to:
http://www.silverlight.net/getstarted/silverlight-5-beta/
Where I have already downloaded the beta tools and runtime for Silverlight 5!
So what’s the problem? What am I missing here? Is there a x64 bit support or no ?
Any thoughts will be appreciated.
By the way – if I switch to a 32 bit sidebar version on PC – all works fine…
UPDATE: Silverlight 5 RC version just released, with 64 bit support
http://10rem.net/blog/2011/09/01/silverlight-5-rc-now-available
I know that the recommended language for Windows Phone 7 development is C#.
However, for various reasons, I very much prefer continuing to program in standard C++, if possible.
Is it possible to program for Windows Phone 7 in standard C++ only?
If the answer is yes, what tools and resources do I need to accomplish that?
EDIT, finally: for WP7 it won't ever be, but for Windows Phone 8 - yes you can. Native apps, C/C++, iOS/Android portability and code sharing, DirectX. You'll need Visual Studio 2012 and Windows 8 for WP8 development, though. VS2010 is not getting the requisite SDK. To run the emulator, you'll need a 64-bit physical Windows 8 box with a SLAT-enabled CPU. You can still develop on a virtual machine, but you'd need a device to run apps, the emulator won't start.
The nongame UI, however, will still be XAML-based and managed. The entirety of Win32 API will not be supported. They're pushing a model with managed UI layer and a native middleware beneath it. Purely native development is still not an option; although one might try with WinMD classes as code-behind for XAML. The visual XAML designer will probably choke, and you'll need a dummy managed DLL anyway.
EDIT: even assembly, as long as it's targeting Thumb-2 and the mnemonics are UAL-style. For running on the simulator, you'd have to produce an alternative set of assembly files (or other sources) targeting Intel.
For the sake of posterity, here's the pre-06/20/2012 answer:
If you work for Microsoft or an OEM, then yes. Otherwise, no (for now).
There's hope though. Google did relent and issued their NDK after a while; Microsoft might, too. The native code capability is already there. Once they come up with a sensible sandboxing solution, why not.
Also, there's already some pressure from big-name software vendors to open up native development. Mozilla people stated outright that there will be no Firefox on WP7 unless it's native. Similar rumors about Flash.
EDIT: if you want a native SDK on WP7, like I do, please go sign the petition here and/or the one over there. Thank you!
EDIT2: see this. It's a leak and therefore not official, but still, I say there's some hope.
EDIT3: also this. Still not official, but this rumor moves the timeframe for native app support even closer - to the upcoming Tango release.
EDIT4: Microsoft seems to be pretty keen to promote WinRT, their new tablet-oriented XAML-based app platform, which allows for (among other things) unmanaged C++. Now, on every other major mobile OS the tablet and the phone app stacks are one and the same. Just sayin'.
EDIT5: there's been some proof-of-concept work along the lines of C++ => LLVM => MSIL and C++ => LLVM => C#, but nothing production-quality so far.
Phone manufacturers such as Samsung can deploy applications written in unmanaged code, but all other developers can not.
No that is not possible. Microsoft has made a decision to only allow application developers to use managed code on the Windows Phone 7 devices.
According to Wikipedia Windows Phone 7.0 runs Windows CE 6.0 R3/7.0 hybrid as operating system.
In theory one could use C++ to build standard* C++ programs targeting Windows CE 6.0 R3 and 7.0 (supposed to come out on Q1 2011). I mean all the standard* dlls should be there (gdi32.dll, user32.dll) Internet Explorer and other C++ programs are still running on Windows Phone 7.
The how to get the application on the phone? and how to run the application on the phone? are the next questions which at the moment I don't know how to answer.
This interview tells something about it: Writing the WP7 App Platform in C# and C++ I haven't watched it yet, so you might add respective comments :)
Windows Phone 7 supports Silverlight and XNA.
All programs for Windows Phone 7 are written in .NET managed code. It is also possible to write Windows Phone 7 applications in Visual Basic .NET.
Visual Studio 2010 Express for Windows Phone includes XNA Game Studio 4.0 and an on-screen phone emulator, and also integrates with Visual Studio 2010. You can develop visuals and animations for Silverlight applications using Microsoft Expression Blend.
The Silverlight and XNA platforms for Windows Phone 7 share some libraries, and you can use some XNA libraries in a Silverlight program and vice versa.
But you can’t create a program that mixes visuals from both platforms. Maybe that will be possible in the future, but not now.
EDIT:
to be more clear..there is no native C++ support you'll have to use either Silverlight or XNA,both are based on .net framework.
I have an existing application developed in VC++ 6.0 which has been installed in many customer sites throughout the world.
This application was working fine until sometime back when the Microsoft KB981793 hot fix was applied. This hotfix has changes related to Timezones and was crashing a crash due to an array overflow in our application code. When this patch was removed the application no longer crashed.
But the interesting thing is this crash was observed only in WinXP and Win2k3 machines and not in Vista or Win7 machines. Any reason why this works this way.
For XP and 2K3, Microsoft specifies minimum service pack levels as prerequisites. For Vista and 7 they don't require prerequisites even though service packs exist for Vista.
KB981793 for XP and 2003 touches Updspapi.dll, KB981793 for Vista or Windows 7 does not. This file is not related to timezones directly, but instead relates to the "setupAPI" (which includes device managament).