Visual Studio

🕒 Created: 2025-01-09 | Updated: 2025-12-13

MSVC Compiler
- Microsoft Visual C++ Compiler (MSVC) :
  - The default compiler for Visual Studio.
  - Supports modern C++ standards (C++11, C++17, C++20, etc.).
MSBuild
- Tool used to build Visual Studio projects.
- Responsible for interpreting and executing project files ( .vcxproj ).
Windows Tools
- Windows SDK : Automatically included with Windows development option.
- Windows Resource Compiler : For working with resource files.
- Linker : To create PE/COFF binaries used by Windows.
Debugger
- Visual Studio includes a debugger that works with PDBs (Program Database Files) generated by the compiler.
C++ Libraries
- Microsoft C++ Standard Library (STL) :
  - Optimized C++ standard implementation for Windows.
- ATL (Active Template Library) :
  - For creating COM-based applications.
- MFC (Microsoft Foundation Classes) :
  - For creating Win32-style graphical interfaces.
Graphics Tools
- Blend for Visual Studio :
  - Used to create graphical interfaces using XAML.
- DirectX SDK (now integrated into Windows SDK):
  - For 3D graphics and game development.
Integration Tools
- vcpkg :
  - C++ package manager to download and configure external dependencies.
- Windows Performance Toolkit :
  - Tool for analyzing performance and resource usage.

Using files from one project in another project .
- Project Settings -> C/C++ -> General -> Additional Include Directories .

.sln
- "Visual Studio Solution".
.vcxproj
- "VC++ Project".
.vcxproj.filters
- "VC++ Project Filters".
- These are folders that exist in the project, but not in the file system; it's just a file filter for organization.
- "Virtual organization".
- ShowAllFiles is super useful to finally see the actual files.
- .
.vcxproj.user
- "Per-User Project Options".
- Current Visual Studio configuration.

Linking Libraries in Visual Studio .
- At no point does he explain how to create a library, only how to use one.
- In the second half of the video, he explains the process.
- He downloads a folder with binaries and uses only:
  - GLFW\include
    - For the header files.
  - GLFW\lib-vc2015
    - For the static library and/or dynamic library.
    - He uses only the static library.
- For the header files:
  - Project Settings -> C/C++ -> General -> Additional Include Directories .
    - $(SolutionDir)Dependencies\GLFW\include
- For the libraries:
  - Project Settings -> Linker -> General -> Additional Library Directories .
    - $(SolutionDir)Dependencies\GLFW\lib-vc2015
  - Project Settings -> Linker -> Input -> Additional Dependencies .
    - glfw3.lib
From what I understand, the Linker options in Project Settings do not appear when creating a static library .lib .

Sometimes building a Project can cause others to be built, due to:
- Project Settings -> C/C++ -> General -> Additional Include Directories .
- or
- Project Settings -> BuildEvents .
This is done automatically due to the "dependency graph" created, where dependencies are always built before the Project.
%(AdditionalIncludeDirectories)
Thing .
- He uses Premake, not CMake.

Note :
- Considering that each Project can have both outputs defined individually, for each configuration and platform, this creates A LOT of confusion when set strangely.
  - Can generate billions of scattered files, making it very confusing to understand where things are and which files are important.
- I liked the configs below. They helped.
Output Directory:
- $(SolutionDir)out\$(ProjectName)\$(Platform)\$(Configuration)\
Intermediate Directory:
- $(SolutionDir)intermediates\$(ProjectName)\$(Platform)\$(Configuration)\