Windows API Code Pack 过去、现在与将来

     其实Windows API Code Pack 的功能远远大于这些，下面是Windows API Code Pack 可以实现的所有功能，可见它的确是一个强大的开发工具。那么在未来的开发过程中The Windows API Code Pack Team 也希望听到广大开发者对于这款开发工具的意见或建议，以便更好的完善Windows API Code Pack 各项功能。

>> Windows 7 Taskbar

    · Jump Lists, Icon Overlay, Progress Bar, Tabbed Thumbnails, and Thumbnail Toolbars

>> Windows Shell

     · Windows 7 Libraries 

     · Windows Shell Search API support 

     · Explorer Browser Control 

     · A hierarchy of Shell Namespace entities 

     · Windows Shell property system 

     · Drag and Drop for Shell Objects 

     · Windows Vista and Windows 7 Common File Dialogs, including custom controls 

     · Known Folders and non-file system containers

>> DirectX

     · Direct3D 11.0, Direct3D 10.1/10.0, DXGI 1.0/1.1, Direct2D 1.0, DirectWrite, Windows Imaging Component (WIC) APIs

>> Windows Vista and Windows 7 Task Dialogs

>> Sensor Platform APIs

     · Extended Linguistic Services APIs 

     · Power Management APIs 

     · Application Restart and Recovery APIs 

     · Network List Manager APIs 

     · Command Link control and System defined Shell icons

     下文转自Yochay Kiriaty 原文，对Windows API Code Pack 感兴趣的朋友可以到文中提供的链接地址发表自己的意见。

<b>Some Background</b>

You may think of the Windows API Code Pack as the closest thing to an “official” managed API for Windows on top of the .NET Framework. The Windows API Code Pack is a free, managed source code library provided by Microsoft as-is. You should consider this library as if you wrote that code. It is a great starting point and provides a really solid solution for managed code developers who create Windows application and looking to light up their applications. It covers a lot of the new Windows 7 features as well as some more fundamental core features from the Windows Vista timeframe.

In the process of updating Windows Vista Bridge, we realized that the old name doesn't fit the new Library. Because this library is no longer tied to a specific Windows release, we decided to change the name to the rather unwieldy but descriptive <b>Windows API Code Pack for Microsoft .NET Framework</b>. Unlike Vista Bridge that shipped <b>after</b> Vista was released, the Alpha version (version 0.8) of the Windows API Code Pack was released on April 20, 2009, six months <b>before</b> Windows 7 shipped. Releasing an early version allowed us to solicit developers’ feedback, update our feature list, and discover more bugs. It also allowed us to actually tell a managed code stories for Windows 7, since back then the .NET Framework (3.5) didn’t support any Windows 7 features.

<b>Windows API Code Pack Version 1.0.1</b>

<b>Windows API Code Pack Version 1.X</b>

We didn’t stop working on the Windows API Code Pack! In the next few weeks/months we’ll release another version that will include bug fixing, major code cleanup and standardization, and few new features.

The team working on the Code Pack gave the existing code base a major facelift. Following the Microsoft development process, the original code was reviewed against a number of criteria, including Visual Studio FxCop analysis, updated naming conventions, improved performance, and upgrades, resulting in a much cleaner and more cohesive baseline. This baseline code will serve us internally for future releases, and I know developers will appreciate it as well.

While these code changes do not result in many new features, they do result in a much more robust and easy to maintain and debug code base upon which we can build going forward. We are working on a small set of new features for our next release, which will ship in few weeks.

We are especially interested in improving support for the Windows Shell, specifically in the areas of Shell integration, support for file handlers and properties, libraries, and search and indexing. We are also looking into adding social and web APIs related to Windows, as well as some fundamentals around Windows Services and Task Scheduling and Power Management. Again, if you have any additional ideas or feedback, we are listening.

本文转自Gnie博客园博客，原文链接：http://www.cnblogs.com/gnielee/archive/2010/04/28/windows-api-code-pack-past-present-future.html，如需转载请自行联系原作者