是否可以在 Windows 8 环境下运行在 Visual Studio 2005 上编译的 VC++、Win32 应用程序？

Question

I am a C++ Developer and learning developing an application that runs on Windows 8 environment.

My current application is VC++ - Win32 (Non-MFC) application, it is compiled on Visual Studio 2005.
It runs on Windows XP, Windows 7 very well.

My Questions:

1. Is there any tutorial available freely that help me to make my application run on Windows 8?
2. Is it strongly required to re-write the code and convert my application to Metro Style Application?

Answer 1

You can run the application on Windows 8 (except Windows RT) as a regular win32 application. We currently compile our windows app with Visual Studio 2005, and it works on Windows 2000 to Windows 8.

If you want to make it a "Windows Store App" with the interface formerly known as Metro, you'll need to rewrite at least the user interface to use the new Metro APIs, and you won't be able to use Visual Studio 2005 for that. If you did that you'd need to make two versions of the app, one for the "Windows store" on windows 8 and one for all previous versions of Windows.

Answer 2

Your application should almost certainly run just fine on Windows 8 if it runs fine on 7 and Vista, provided that any necessary runtime components (eg the VS2005 redists) are installed, if they're not already present.

As for rewriting it as Metro style, that really depends, both on the app itself, and whether you think it makes sense for your target market. That question can only be answered by you (and I guess, your users).

Answer 3

For question 1, check MSDN, a lot of material there. For 2, not required, most of old application can run on Windows 8 without modification. you don't need to convert your application to Metro style

Answer 4

And the reason why your store application needs to be written using Visual Studio 2012 is because for Store apps, only the C++ runtime from VS 2012 is supported. See the below post for more details:

http://blogs.msdn.com/b/vcblog/archive/2012/09/28/10354327.aspx