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Groups > comp.lang.basic.visual.misc > #2014

Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic

From Tom Shelton <tom_shelton@comcast.invalid>
Newsgroups comp.lang.basic.visual.misc
Subject Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic
Date 2014-03-24 13:02 -0600
Organization A noiseless patient Spider
Message-ID <lgpvga$mf5$1@dont-email.me> (permalink)
References <lgmb2u$q6c$1@dont-email.me> <lgmn5l$7vh$1@dont-email.me>

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Mayayana expressed precisely :
>   A few distinctions: This is a VB group, mainly
> for VB5/6. VB is for writing compiled Windows
> software. It's not the same thing as VB.Net
> If you're using .Net you can try the web forums
> or this group:
>
> microsoft.public.dotnet.languages.vb
>
> Windows 8 and Windows RT, or Surface RT, are
> two different things. 

Nope.  They are the same thing.  Windows RT is Windows 8 compiled on 
ARM.

> Windows 8 in NT 6.2 It's
> Windows, and you can write software for it.
> Windows RT, and the Metro UI in Windows 8,
> do not run Windows software. They run only
> "apps" using the WinRT runtime. Those are the
> programs that you can put into the MS online
> store. They will not run on Windows itself.
>

What?  The WinRT runtime is present on Windows 8 and Windows RT.  Most 
software written to target WinRT will run on both Windows 8 and Windows 
RT.  You just have to click the check box so that the software gets 
compiled for ARM as well.

> (For all practical purposes, there are really two
> OSs. Win8 and WinRT. Windows 8 includes the
> WinRT system as Metro, but Windows RT does
> not have Windows 8 capability. 

That is completely wrong.  In fact, Windows RT does contain the win32 
API.  How do you think Microsoft got office to run on it?  The desktop? 
 Pretty much all of the standard command line tools?  Many of the 
standard class drivers that ship with windows?   This is why you are 
able to plug in a whole host of USB devices into a Surface RT/Surface 2 
tablet and have them work.

There are two reasons that standard win32 software won't run on Windows 
RT.

1) Processor architecture.  Again, RT runs on ARM processors - so, 
unless you compile your code for ARM, it aint going to run.

2) MS has limited access to the win32 api to first party only.  They 
have done this by not providing a set of compiler tools for win32 apps 
and by turning on a flag in the NT kernel that disallows software that 
isn't signed by MS from running.

There is a jail break for RT devices that turns off that kernel flag, 
as well as several open source win32 projects that have been compiled 
using MinGW to target the Tegra 3 processor in the Surface RT.

<snip>

>   It sounds like what you want to do is to write
> a Metro app. Even then, you can't write once
> to run on the various systems. 

Partially true...  Software targeting the WinRT runtime will run on 
both Windows 8 and Windows RT.  Much of the code targeting WinRT 
runtime will also work on Windows Phone 8 - but, not all of it, since 
Windows Phone 8 only implements a limited subset of WinRT.  The API 
parity is expected to be much closer with Windows PHone 8.1.  The fact 
is you can get a fairly high degree of code reuse across Windows 8, RT 
and Windows Phone - with much more comming in the not very distant 
future.

And of course you realize that C++ is one of the surpported development 
platforms across all 3 platforms as well?  Just pointing out that you 
are NOT limited to .NET or Javascript.

Of course, you have at least answered one thing for the OP correctly- 
you can't use VB.CLASSIC in any form to write a windows store 
application targeting the modern ui.  The most you could do is create a 
standard x86 standard win32 application and have it found via the 
windows store - but, it wouldn't be usable for users on Windows RT 
devices.  And you certainly can't do anything with windows phone if you 
are so inclined.

-- 
Tom Shelton

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Thread

Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-03-23 10:55 +0100
  Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2014-03-23 09:23 -0400
    Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-03-23 16:04 +0100
      Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2014-03-23 12:19 -0400
    Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Tom Shelton <tom_shelton@comcast.invalid> - 2014-03-24 13:02 -0600
      Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2014-03-24 19:25 -0400
        Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Tom Shelton <tom_shelton@comcast.invalid> - 2014-03-24 20:37 -0600
      Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2014-03-25 10:01 -0400
        Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Tom Shelton <tom_shelton@comcast.invalid> - 2014-03-25 17:12 -0600
          Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Schmidt <ng@vbRichClient.com> - 2014-03-31 01:09 +0200
      Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-03-25 23:12 +0100
        Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Tom Shelton <tom_shelton@comcast.invalid> - 2014-03-25 17:19 -0600
          Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-03-26 01:28 +0100
            Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Tom Shelton <tom_shelton@comcast.invalid> - 2014-03-25 20:55 -0600
              Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-03-26 11:06 +0100
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic "Mayayana" <mayayana@invalid.nospam> - 2014-03-26 08:51 -0400
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-04-13 02:11 +0200
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic "Farnsworth" <nospam@nospam.com> - 2014-04-12 23:52 -0400
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Deanna Earley <dee.earley@icode.co.uk> - 2014-04-14 09:01 +0100
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic "Farnsworth" <nospam@nospam.com> - 2014-04-15 04:56 -0400
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Deanna Earley <dee.earley@icode.co.uk> - 2014-04-15 10:10 +0100
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-04-30 00:43 +0200
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-04-30 00:41 +0200
                Re: Windows 8 Apps with Visual Basic Rudolf Harras <rudi007@temporaryforwarding.com> - 2014-04-30 00:47 +0200

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