Windows 7 new APIs and Libraries

Windows 7 new APIs and Libraries :

1. Multi-Touch
2. Ribbon
3. Location
4. Shell Integration

1. Multi-Touch
Touch-based interfaces allow users to interact with applications in a more intuitive way. Windows 7 introduces multi-touch input and manipulation processing through Windows Touch.

For native C++ developers, MFC now supports using a touch-enabled interface. MFC will do much of the heavy lifting: it listens for touch-related messages from Windows and calls out to a number of virtual functions to handle them. Developers merely need to register for touch input, set the gesture configuration, and override these virtual methods as required to touch-enable their application.
WPF 4 includes object model additions for touch interfaces so managed code developers can easily add touch support to their applications as well. Multiple finger input will be exposed through existing and new input events, while new manipulation and inertia events will be exposed for developers to consume.

2. Ribbon
Adding a Ribbon to your application can help organize your commands, tasks, and menus in a friendly way that makes it easier for your customers to find what they’re looking for. Whether your application is written in Win32, MFC, or WPF, new controls and APIs will help you add a Ribbon to your application.

If you write Win32 applications, the Ribbon framework provides a set of APIs for creating a Ribbon for your application. You can find out more about the Windows Ribbon Framework for Win32 here.

The new WPF Ribbon Control will be released out of band around the same time as WPF 4 through the Office UI Licensing site. You can find instructions on downloading the WPF Ribbon (currently in Preview) here. The WPF Ribbon will feature skins for Windows 7 and Office and all the standard Ribbon features that users are familiar with, including tabs and groups, dynamic resizing, quick access toolbar, application menu, contextual tabs, key tips, and more! The Ribbon will remain available as a separate, standalone assembly.

3. Location
Windows 7 features the Location platform, which makes it easy to write applications that can make use of the user’s location. The Location platform opens the doors to some interesting application scenarios – especially on mobile computers. For example, a location-aware application might use the current location to show the user nearby restaurants or shops, or an instant messaging or email application might tag messages with the sender’s location.

The Location platform provides a way for location devices, such as GPS and WWAN radios, to integrate with Windows and includes an API that applications can use to determine the current location of the computer. Because the Location API exposes its functionality through COM interfaces, C++ programmers and scripting language programmers alike can take advantage of it. The Windows 7 SDK includes samples and documentation to help you build location-aware applications. Find out more about the COM Location API on MSDN.

In addition to the COM Location API, .NET Framework 4 will include built-in managed APIs for location, making it easy for .NET applications to take advantage of Windows 7’s location capabilities.

4. Shell Integration
Windows 7’s Shell enhancements empower application authors to provide a richer integrated user experience. Jump Lists provide access to contextual startup tasks and files available to the applications. For instance, right-clicking on the Outlook icon will show the mail messages you’ve recently opened in the Jump List:

Windows® API Code Pack - API to access Windows 7 features

Windows® API Code Pack for Microsoft® .NET Framework provides a source code library that can be used to access some new Windows 7 features (and some existing features of older versions of Windows operating system) from managed code. These Windows features are not available to developers today in the .NET Framework. The individual features supported in this version (v1.0) of the library are:

Windows 7 Taskbar Jump Lists, Icon Overlay, Progress Bar, Tabbed Thumbnails, and Thumbnail Toolbars.

Windows 7 Libraries, Known Folders, non-file system containers.

Windows Shell Search API support, a hierarchy of Shell Namespace entities, and Drag and Drop functionality for Shell Objects.

Explorer Browser Control.

Shell property system.

Windows Vista and Windows 7 Common File Dialogs, including custom controls.

Windows Vista and Windows 7 Task Dialogs.

Direct3D 11.0, Direct3D 10.1/10.0, DXGI 1.0/1.1, Direct2D 1.0, DirectWrite, Windows Imaging Component (WIC) APIs. (DirectWrite and WIC have partial support)

Sensor Platform APIs

Extended Linguistic Services APIs

Power Management APIs

Application Restart and Recovery APIs

Network List Manager APIs

Command Link control and System defined Shell icons.What’s New in this update (v1.0):

The new features added in this update of code pack are:

Shell Search API support.

Drag and Drop functionality for Shell objects.

Support for Direct3D and Direct2D interoperability.

Support for Typography and Font enumeration DirectWrite APIs.

ref:
Somasegar’s blog - http://blogs.msdn.com/somasegar/archive/2009/10/02/making-your-application-sparkle-with-windows-7.aspx

Windows 7 Taskbar and Libraries .NET Interop Sample Library - http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/Windows7Taskbar/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ReleaseId=2246

Tim Sneath's Windows 7 Blog - http://blogs.msdn.com/tims/archive/2009/05/06/a-developer-s-guide-to-preparing-for-windows-7.aspx

Windows Team Blog - http://windowsteamblog.com/blogs/developers/default.aspx

Windows Developer's site - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/default.aspx

Windows 7 Developer Guide - http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/Release/ProjectReleases.aspx?ProjectName=Win7DeveloperGuide&ReleaseId=1702

Windows® API Code Pack for Microsoft® .NET Framework -
http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/WindowsAPICodePack

Arun Kishan MSDN Channel 9's Windows' low level architecture - http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/Going+Deep/Arun-Kishan-Process-Management-in-Windows-Vista/

Mark Russinovich's MSDN Channel 9's discussion of Windows 7 kernel-level stuff -http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/Going+Deep/Mark-Russinovich-Inside-Windows-7/

WPF vs Windows Forms vs MFC

WPF vs Windows Forms

WPF is not just for applications which simply require “eye candy.” That is the most common and frustrating misperception about WPF which I’ve encountered. Sure, WPF has a lot of support for flashy visuals and animations. But that’s not all it’s good for. If you’ve worked with WPF for any substantial period of time you are probably well aware of this fact, so I won’t keep harping on the issue.

The true power of WPF resides in the data binding mechanism and the way it shares resources across the application. On extra benefit that comes from the learning curve is that who learn how to decouple logic from UI. It’s not because of a pattern, but because of the data binding mechanism. Truly an application will last longer, when the UI can be changed without producing problems to the logic. Use the templates right and you can change a piece of UI code that reflects to the entire application. And don’t get me started about the usage of Control Templates.

WPF is an especially great platform to use if your applications involve various media types.

For example,

1. If you need to incorporate video, or documents, or 3D content, or animated transitions between a sequence of images, or a combination of any of the above.

2. WPF is also great if you need to create a skinned user interface

3. If you need to bind to XML data

4. Dynamically load portions of a user interface from a Web service

5. Want to create a desktop application with a Web-like navigation style.

WinForms definitely still has a role to play, despite the fact that WPF has hit the scene. If you are building applications with no need for the extensive modern functionality in WPF, then there is no compelling reason to leave behind a time-tested developer-approved platform. WinForms certainly has more 3rd party controls available, online resources, developer communities, etc. than WPF currently does. It’s much easier to find WinForms developers than WPF developers. Also, WinForms currently has a much better design-time experience in Visual Studio than WPF. That fact alone is a very compelling reason to stick with WinForms for a while.

Lastly, don’t forget that it is possible to use WPF controls in a WinForms app, and WinForms controls in a WPF app. If you have a substantial investment in a WinForms code-base, but want to use some aspect(s) of WPF, you can leverage the interop support to make that possible. Just be sure to read up on the limitations involved with WinForms-WPF interop before getting too far down that path.

WPF Positives & Nagatives

+ Powerfull styling and skinning structure
+ Easy to create an own Look and Feel
+ Does support Windows Forms
+ The future technology for developing Vista Applications
+ The ability to reuse existing code
+ Highly advanced databinding possible
+ Declarative vs procedural code

+ Vector Graphics simplifes painting Operations

+ 3D

+ Animations

+ WPF Everywhere Idea (Silverlight and Microframework)

- Requires .NET Framework 3.0
- Compared to Windows Forms, still in development fase
- Requires Dx9 compatible vidcard for advanced graphics

Windows Forms Positives & Nagatives
+ Extensive documentation to be found on the internet
+ Plenty of examples
+ Does support WPF
- How long will this be supported? (I've read somewhere that Microsoft is only developing WPF now, only maintanance for Winforms)
- Design your own look and feel in a application is a lot of work.

ref:

http://joshsmithonwpf.wordpress.com/2007/09/05/wpf-vs-windows-forms/

http://social.msdn.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/wpf/thread/42636e55-a1e0-4b29-bbd1-cd8073585584

http://www.devzest.com/blog/post/WPF-vs-Windows-Forms-From-Control-Authoring-Perspective.aspx

http://sarafianalex.wordpress.com/2008/11/25/wpf-vs-windows-forms/

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms788719%28VS.85%29.aspx

http://tozon.info/blogs/andrej/post/2007/10/09/WPF-vs-Windows-Forms-%28data%29-binding.aspx

Windows Forms vs MFC

If you are accustomed to MFC, you might be used to creating certain types of applications that are not yet explicitly supported in Windows Forms. Windows Forms applications are equivalent to MFC dialog applications. However, they do not provide the infrastructure to directly support other MFC application types like OLE document server/container, ActiveX documents, the Document/View support for single-document interface (SDI), multiple-document interface (MDI), and multiple top-level interface (MTI). You can write your own logic to create these applications.

ref:

Windows Forms/MFC Programming Differences - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/0xb61xs7.aspx

MFC and WinForms Integration -

http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=987021bc-e575-4fe3-baa9-15aa50b0f599&displaylang=en

Using a Windows Form User Control in MFC - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ahdd1h97.aspx