Member Avatar for falcon60

Hello! I'm beginning learning C++ and I was wondering, does Visual Studio 6.0 support all of the language features or is it too outdated now? If so are there any free compilers/linkers that I can use for windows programming? I'm also worried about the windows API headers being outdated as I plan to get windows 7 soon.

Also, I noticed that the windows controls in VS6.0, like buttons and textboxes, don't even have the XP style and they look more like windows 98 style. Why is that and can I change it somehow?

TIA!

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Member Avatar for jwenting

Visual C++ 6 doesn't implement the full ISO/ANSI standard. It also doesn't support .NET or 64 bit development.

Of course it doesn't support the XP LAF, it is targetted at Windows 95, 10 years older.
That can maybe be changed by using 3rd party GUI libraries, but not natively.

Member Avatar for dusktreader

Hello! I'm beginning learning C++ and I was wondering, does Visual Studio 6.0 support all of the language features or is it too outdated now? If so are there any free compilers/linkers that I can use for windows programming? I'm also worried about the windows API headers being outdated as I plan to get windows 7 soon.

Also, I noticed that the windows controls in VS6.0, like buttons and textboxes, don't even have the XP style and they look more like windows 98 style. Why is that and can I change it somehow?

TIA!

Qt Creator is a great integrated IDE for c++ development within the Qt framework. Qt is very portable cross platform GUI toolkit. If you are looking for a free IDE / GUI creator you should really check it out:
http://qt.nokia.com/products/developer-tools

Member Avatar for falcon60

Thank you for your replies. So are you saying that the windows xp "look and feel" is not built in to XP itself? I've always assumed it was part of the GDI or something.

And are there any free C++ compilers that support the full ANSI/ISO standard?

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