What are the best books for learning MFC ?

Anil Mandava

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Jan 18, 1994, 12:59:22 PM1/18/94

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Hi,

Can anyone suggest some good book(s) for learning MFC.
Thanx in advance.

Anil.
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Chris Marriott

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Jan 18, 1994, 5:29:29 PM1/18/94

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In article <CJu7B...@unix.portal.com> man...@shell.portal.com writes:

>Hi,
>
> Can anyone suggest some good book(s) for learning MFC.
> Thanx in advance.

Assuming you've first read the essential book - Petzold - I'd go for
"Inside Visual C++" by David Kruglinski (Microsoft Press).

Chris
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Jody Justus

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Feb 9, 1994, 12:11:18 PM2/9/94

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: Can anyone suggest some good book(s) for learning MFC.
: Thanx in advance.

Try Using Visual C++ by the Microsoft Press.
I think the Author is Kruglinski.

- J

David Brabant

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Feb 10, 1994, 10:57:13 AM2/10/94

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>- J

"Inside Visual C++", David J. Kruglinksi, MicroSoft Press,
ISBN 1-55615-511-5

David

Jody Justus

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Feb 10, 1994, 11:02:13 AM2/10/94

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Jody Justus (jju...@netcom.com) wrote:
: : Can anyone suggest some good book(s) for learning MFC.
: : Thanx in advance.

: - J

I made a mistake. Actually the book is called "Inside Visual C++"
by David J. Kruglinski. This book is great.

Another book is "Visual C++ Programming"
by Holzner

Holzner's book gives a much more high-level overview and
is more suited for new Windows programmers.

Hope this helps.

- J

Peter Nelson

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Feb 20, 1994, 10:53:51 AM2/20/94

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Jody Justus (jju...@netcom.com) wrote:

: : - J

Just a caveat: The original question the poster asked was
where he could learn *MFC*. As their titles imply, both
of the above books seem to be on VC++.

I have no experience with the Holzner, but I have raised a
problem I've had with the Kruglinski in another thread on
this newsgroup: VC++ relies heavily on various Wizards that
are supplied with it. And the Kruglinski relies heavily on
them as well. App Wizard, especially, does code generation
and the Kruglinski does not, IMO, do a good job in his introduc-
tory examples of explaining the code that gets generated. As a
programmer, I'm VERY uncomfortable writing any program whose
behavior I can't fully account for or predict. With App Wizard
you type in a project name and click here and there and viola!,
you've got a whole bunch of .cpp and .h files complete with
derived classes and member functions overridden and message
handlers and diagnostics and all kinds of neat stuff.

But I, at least, don't know where this construction is fully
explained so I've had to spend most of my time with the Kruglinski
poring over listings of all those files figuring out what the hell
the App Wizard did, and this is very much *NOT* in the spirit
of C++ or object-oriented programming, where you shouldn't have to
worry about that stuff.

Does anyone know any good *MFC* tutorials out there?

---peter

Saud Alshibani

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Feb 21, 1994, 12:07:32 PM2/21/94

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pne...@world.std.com (Peter Nelson) writes:

>: : - J

Hello Peter,

Look at the following books:

1 - "Windows Programming with Microsoft C++", by Michael J. Young.
ISBN: 0-7821-1147-5. Please note that the author has come up with an
updated version for Visual C++.

2 - "Microsoft Foundation Class library", by Namir Clement Shammas.
ISBN: 0-672-30067-2.

Please note that these books cover the .0. Which I think they should
provide you with the skills to understand and move up to the new MFC2.0 &
MFC2.5. These books demonstrate how to create an MFC based windows program
manually (they do provide the source code on a disk). Now that you know how
to develope an MFC windows program, you'll be able to understand the logic
provided in the VC++ Wizards.

Bye,
Saud

sa...@anasazi.com
FDC/Advanced Technology Center

George Yefchak

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Feb 23, 1994, 2:19:37 PM2/23/94

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Well, I haven't found any of this easy either, but the Kruglinski
book is my main resource. There is another book aimed more at
MFC issues, though. It's "Microsoft Foundation Class Library
Programming, by Holzner; it's part of the Brady series of
computer books and should be available at any bookstore
that has a large computer section.

--George

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Morris Myers

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Feb 23, 1994, 7:56:30 PM2/23/94

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In article <CLoz0...@hplabsz.hpl.hp.com>, yef...@hplabsz.hpl.hp.com (George Yefchak) writes:
> Well, I haven't found any of this easy either, but the Kruglinski
> book is my main resource. There is another book aimed more at
> MFC issues, though. It's "Microsoft Foundation Class Library
> Programming, by Holzner; it's part of the Brady series of
> computer books and should be available at any bookstore
> that has a large computer section.
>
> --George

Holzner's book is a good overall learning tool but it has several typos.
These can drive you a bit astray if you don't read things very carefully.
I don't have my list with me. Other than the slight false starts that I
made because of the typos I found the book quite useful.

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Ray Wood

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Feb 25, 1994, 9:32:05 AM2/25/94

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pne...@world.std.com (Peter Nelson) writes:

> Does anyone know any good *MFC* tutorials out there?

There is an alternative to studying a tutorial which I have used, and I
am sure I am not unique. Get out a pencil and a notebook, then start
tracing thru a MFC application using Visual C++'s F8 key.

If you are patient, and doggedly determined, you will find that every
thing MFC does can be traced back to basic SDK, C, and C++ code.

But, be prepared to be overwhelmed. At some point, you may even begin to
reconsider whether you really want (or more importantly, can afford) to
spend the time to understand every line of code MFC hides from you.

As you step thru the code, you will find that Microsoft makes liberal
use of all the error-handling and debugging tools built into MFC (TRACE,
TRACE0, TRACE1, TRACE2, VERIFY, ASSERT, ASSERT_VALID, etc.) It is my
opinion that Microsoft did an acceptable job of 'bullet-proofing' MFC.
It is not perfect, but it is pretty good work. So, I spend most of my
time building upon MFC, rather than tearing it apart.

I am reminded of the first time I attempted to step thru the startup and
epilogue code which C 'hides' from the typical programmer. I must confess
that I never bothered to finish stepping thru it all (tho' others have
and that's fine, for them).

Ray Wood , raw...@rd1.interlan.com