xxv
Preface
This book describes application development using the Microsoft Windows Appli-
cation Programming Interface (API), concentrating on the core system services,
including the file system, process and thread management, interprocess communi-
cation, network programming, and synchronization. User interf
aces, internals,
and I/O drivers, although important and interesting topics, a re beyond the book’s
scope. The examples concentrate on realistic scenarios, and in many cases the
examples can be used as the foundations for real applications.
The Win32/Win64 API, or the Windows API,
is supported by Microsoft’s
family of 32-bit and 64-bit operating systems, which currently consists of Windows
XP, Windows 2000, and Windows 2003. Older Windows fa