What IDE is needed to develop a first time simple Windows application? - windows

Question

I have never done any Windows coding and I would like to give it a try. To create a simple application e.g. a window that displays a plain "Hello World" message.
What IDE (open source?) would I need to start of with and what language is used for the native Windows applications?
This is not for professional use, just for an amateur.

Answer 1

I'd recommend going for Visual Studio Express, you can use c#, Visual Basic (VB.NET) or c++, it's free and easy. It also makes the step to the larger Visual Studio simple if you're ever going to do that.
check out Microsoft Visual Studio Express
edit: added VB.NET
Since i'm editing anyway, how about some additions; If you prefer opensource you could also look into SharpDevelop (c# and boo) and/or monodevelop (c#, but better for linux/multiplatform, not so great for just windows imho but yout mileage may vary)
edit: 6 years later.
Microsoft has, in the mean time, provided us with Visual Studio Community Edition, which is in essence a complete Visual Studio professional, but free (some restrictions do apply). I do believe this is now the absolute best way to develop most non commercial, and possibly some commercial, Windows oriented projects you can get.

Answer 2

notepad + .NET Framework + cmd
type:
using System.Windows.Forms;
public class HelloWorld
{
public static void Main()
{
MessageBox.Show("Hello, World!");
}
}
save as %WINDIR%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\vX.X.XXXXX\hello.cs
open command line
cd %WINDIR%\Microsoft.NET\Framework\vX.X.XXXXX
%homedrive%
compile:
csc /target:winexe hello.cs
run:
hello
If you're looking for open source IDE I recommend Eclipse with plugins or MonoDevelop (wikipedia).

Answer 3

There are a lot of IDEs out there, if you want to develop for windows I'd recommend .net and the free "express" series of Microsoft tools.

Answer 4

If you're new to gui programming, Shoes is a fun way to pick up some of the concepts as well as learn some ruby along the way. It's primarily a learning tool however, so you'll need to eventually pick up Visual Studio (or something similar) when you're ready to develop a functional windows app.
Edit: I see you've done some programming in linux from one of your comments, so this might be a bit too rudimentary for you. For anyone new to programming and wanting to try their hand at a windows program, Shoes is worth looking at. The free version of Visual Studio is definitely what you'll want to check out, or alternatively you could continue to work in Eclipse on windows, as you're already familiar with it.

Answer 5

Try either AutoIt or AutoHotkey. I personally recommend AutoHotkey.
For LOTS of sample (and useful!) scripts, visit this page: http://www.donationcoder.com/Software/Skrommel/

Answer 6

You could look into VBScript, using notepad to edit the code. It is quite simple to program with, and there are a lot of examples.
Hello World would be done by placing the following into a file called HelloWorld.vbs and double clicking it from an explorer window.
MsgBox("Hello World")
A message box with hello world will then display.

Answer 7

There is wxDev-Cpp IDE (google for it). It's great for small apps. It's based on wxWidgets, so you also get portability for free.

Answer 8

If you're looking for Open Source and cross platform compatibility I would look at Eclipse. However if you simply want "free" I would also look at IntelliJ IDE which is designed for JAVA development and is also cross platform but not Open Source. They offer some free licensed versions.

Answer 9

You don't have to use an IDE to create a Hello World gui application.
Libraries like Qt, wxWidgets, GTK+, etc, allow you to write such programs, and their tutorials usually have some sample "hello word" programs.
UPDATE
I believe most GUI libraries (try to) maintain platform native look and feel; or at least that's what the docs say.