C++ beginner .. well almost !

Hi guys,

I am gonna ask some stupid questions here which may not make any sense to all of you c++ guru's but they can be real helpfull to me.

I am one of those guys who programmed in c/c++ and actually learnt it pretty well. Then for some reason started programming in VB. And now I am sick of it. Its nothing but a stupid piece of ****. I want to get back to my C/C++ world. And now i just do not know where to start from. I programmed in Turbo c/c++ based compiler and did a good job at that time. Now i want to learn Visual C++, and i understand its nothing but another c++ compiler. I want to learn all the things from creating console based c++ programs to creating standard/MFC dll's. (I do not know the difference between them though).

Please help me. I do not know which book i should buy or what should i do. But i want to quit VB ASAP. Please guide me.

Any help would be appreciated.

Since you already know (or have known) C++ I think it would be best to simply look at some example code, find a few simple console apps you want to make and use this to get back into the language. Then you can start learning the more advanced features of C++, those being: templates, polymorphism, containers, iterators and algorithms to name the most important. Get something about OOP design, I'm sure you've lost all feeling for that when programming VB.

Then you can start windows programming, where I would really recommend Programming Windows by Charles Petzold. Although written for C it is the best introduction to the WinAPI even for C++ programmers. Once you're through this book you're ready to start real applications and learn along the way about more advanced windows features like sockets (internet) and the dreaded COM.

That will keep you busy for a while. Even though the temptation might be there, don't use MFC before you know the WinAPI well.

Many thanks for this detailed and Object Oriented explanation of yours.

:D