Does anyone know where I can find some info on this...?

[evil_gamer]

Most of the stuff I see is for STL (Standard Template Lib.) but not for ATL... why is this? Every so often I will see a book for ATL (Active Template Lib.) but like I said, it is not very often.

Anyone know where I can find some info on ATL?? Or have I done lost it and ATL does not exist?:confused:

Thanks

[jim mcnamara]

Al Williams -- 'Windows 2000 System Programming' has a chapter (+one on ActiveX) on ATL. This is assuming you want to just get started.

Tapidaya's 'COM+ Programming: A Practical Guide Using Visual C++ and ATL' is a very thorough, heavy duty text.

:D

[abdul]

"Inside ATL" is also a pretty good book. It talks about the basic structure of COM in first 2 chapters and then it moves on to ATL while still explaining all the COM specific junk.

[MoMad]

BTW: STL and ATL are not the same nor are they related, desptite the post fix "Template Library"!

STL is like a standard library full of template functions/classes/objects etc... and ATL is a subdivision of COM. Or something like that... but they are not in the same book even.

[CornedBee]

STL and ATL are related in what they are: both are collections of template classes that should make something easier.

In case of STL it is i/o, data storage and organisation and lots of other things - it's the C++ equivalent of the CRT. It is standardized and portable. Don't hesitate to use it.
Example: iostream, string, vector

ATL is there to make ActiveX programming easier. It provides standard implementations for some COM interfaces and basically helps you with everything COM-related. It is written by MS, can be used only with VC++ (maybe Borland too), runs only on windows (because it is for COM, maybe it runs on WINE), and is generally only useful in specialized apps, while STL can be used in any app.
Use ATL if you want to write ActiveX controls or such things, if you have VC++.

[Zaei]

The only problem I have with templates is that they are simply horrid to export from a DLL. Everytime I want to use a vector as a member of a class that gets exported, The compiler yells at me =(.

Z.

[parksie]

Originally posted by Zaei
The only problem I have with templates is that they are simply horrid to export from a DLL. Everytime I want to use a vector as a member of a class that gets exported, The compiler yells at me =(.

Z. I think you need to wait until the export keyword gets supported properly for that.

I never had any problems as long as I linked the DLL to the DLL runtime (not the static one).