{"id":303,"date":"2007-08-24T14:30:16","date_gmt":"2007-08-24T13:30:16","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.itwriting.com\/blog\/?p=303"},"modified":"2007-08-24T14:30:16","modified_gmt":"2007-08-24T13:30:16","slug":"mfc-not-dead-massive-update-planned","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.itwriting.com\/blog\/303-mfc-not-dead-massive-update-planned.html","title":{"rendered":"MFC not dead – “massive update” planned"},"content":{"rendered":"

Herb Sutter<\/a> refers to a comment by Bill Dunlap<\/a>, a product manager for Visual C++, on the future of MFC:<\/p>\n

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MFC – we are working on a huge update to MFC that should knock your socks off.  I can’t tell you too much right now, but this is closer than you might thing <g>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Intriguing, since with ATL<\/a> and then the whole .NET thing, including managed C++ and C++\/CLI<\/a>, I’d assumed that MFC was all-but deprecated.<\/p>\n

I can see the value of this for maintaining existing projects, but for new ones? I like this comment by Dan Shappir<\/a>:<\/p>\n

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The only reason I can see for doing significant UI development in C++ is for cross-platform support, and in that case I would probably choose Qt<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Actually I can think of a few other reasons, such as performance and compatibility with older versions of Windows, but then again why not use Delphi<\/a>? <\/p>\n

Talking of Delphi, it’s interesting that according to Shappir’s post referenced above, Microsoft’s Visual C++ team had similar feedback to Borland\/Codegear:<\/p>\n

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Damien Watkins, a Program Manager on the Visual C++ team, stated quite frankly that the feedback they have received from C++ developers is that they prefer to use C# for developing managed code for .NET. So what is the new positioning for C++? Apparently it’s: <\/p>\n