Programming Windows 6th Edition
charlespetzold.com
charlespetzold.com
Last time I read one of his books (admittedly, over a decade ago) it was mostly _C_.
I think it's fantastic.
> And we need more native apps, not less.
Do you mean "managed apps"?
In that case, you're either talking about special case apps that require low level access or low level management (ex: for performance reasons), drivers, special libraries, or might just be holding on to the past.
.NET, C#, and XAML are the highest legitimate programming abstraction layer in Windows and are the way most Windows apps are made these days.
The unerlining management system (and OS) is written in C/C++ and exposes the win32 API. That's always there.
Rarely does anyone make C or unmanaged C++ apps calling the win32 api when you can have .NET Framework and CLR do that for you.
It's not for writing applications, but rather understanding how Windows works (The Cache Manager section for example)
Can anyone point to any good resources for a mostly Unix-based programmer getting up to speed with all the new technology coming in Windows 8 that are available now?
On WPF (the latest on .Net UI) I'd recommend Matthew MacDonald's "Pro WPF in C# 2010: Windows Presentation Foundation in .NET 4".
On Win32 programming (the native code API to Windows) the best source is Petzold himself. It is the Windows equivalent of W. Richard Stevens books for Unix.
The Metro interface is covered in materials on Windows Phone 7. XAML is also covered there and elsewhere as it relates to Silverlight as a programming environment (rather than a browser plugin). Books on .NET are legion - and are the place to start if you are not familiar with the Windows platform.