How do I destruct an object that keeps a reference to itself, because that...
Consider the case of an ordered work queue. Components can queue work to the worker thread, with the expectation that the work will run sequentially. class OrderedWorkQueue { public:...
View ArticleWhat order are pages in a memory-mapped file flushed out to disk?
Say you create a memory-mapped file mapping and write data to it. In which order will the pages be flushed out to disk? Is it in the order the pages were written? Or are pages closer to the beginning...
View ArticleEven if your assembly language code doesn’t call any Windows APIs, you still...
Writing in assembly language doesn't absolve you from adhering to the software conventions. Certainly you have more flexibility in assembly language, but that doesn't give you freedom to do anything...
View ArticlePrecision questioning: The cynical description
Precision questioning is a technique used by some senior executives at Microsoft. Although precision questioning positions itself as a toolkit for critical thinking and problem solving, its use in...
View ArticleAsking for clear written documentation that Require trusted path for...
A customer had turned on the Require trusted path for credential entry policy (under Computer Configuration, Administrative Templates, Windows Components, Credential User Interface). They demanded...
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Why is there a limit of 15 shell icon overlays?
There is a limit of fifteen shell icon overlays. Why fifteen? The value 15 came from the corresponding limit for image lists. The ImageList_SetOverlayImage function supports up to 15 image list...
View ArticleHow can I determine in a C++ header file whether C++/CX is enabled? How about...
Suppose you’re writing a header file that wants to take advantage of C++/CX or C++/WinRT features if the corresponding functionality is available. // async_event_helpers.h #if (? what goes here ?) //...
View ArticleWhat order do the items in the “New” menu appear? It looks kind of random.
When you right-click on an empty space in an Explorer folder and select the New menu item, you always start with Folder and Shortcut, but the rest seems to be a jumbled list of file types. Folder...
View ArticleIf you can use GUIDs to reference files, why not use them to remember...
You can ask for a GUID identifier for a file, and use that GUID to access the file later. You can even recover a (perhaps not the) file name from the GUID. David Trapp wishes programs would use GUIDs...
View ArticleWhat should you do if somebody passes a null pointer for a parameter that...
If you have a function for which a parameter may not be null, what should you do if somebody passes null anyway? There are multiple layers to this question, depending on the technology you are using,...
View ArticleWhy does SetFocus fail without telling me why?
One of my colleagues was debugging a program and discovered that a call to SetFocus returned NULL, which the documentation calls out as indicating an error condition. However, a follow-up call to...
View ArticleA simple workaround for the fact that std::equal takes its predicate by value
The versions of the std::equal function that takes a binary predicate accepts the predicate by value, which means that if you are using a functor, it will be copied, which may be unnecessary or...
View ArticleWhat is WofCompressedData? Does WOF mean that Windows is a dog?
A customer doing performance analysis of their program discovered that there were reads from an alternate data stream called WofCompressedData. On the Internet, if you search for...
View ArticleHow do I write a function that accepts any type of standard container?
Suppose you want a function to accept any sort of standard container. You just want a bunch of, say, integers, and it could arrive in the form of a std::vector<int> or a std::list<int> or a...
View ArticleGetting a value from a std::variant that matches the type fetched from...
Suppose you have two std::variant objects of the same type and you want to perform some operation on corresponding pairs of types. using my_variant = std::variant<int, double, std::string>; bool...
View ArticleThe 2019 Microsoft Giving Campaign Run/Walk comes with some ground rules
Today is the Microsoft Giving Campaign 5K Run/Walk, which raises money in support of the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation, KEXP radio, Boys & Girls Clubs of Bellevue, and (new this year) Plymouth...
View ArticleDetecting whether the -opt flag was passed to cppwinrt.exe: Using __has_include
I was upgrading the Window UWP Samples repo to take advantage of the new -opt flag introduced in C++/WinRT 2.0. This provides performance improvements for accessing static class members, and avoids...
View ArticleWhy was Windows for Workgroups pejoratively nicknamed Windows for Warehouses?
The first version of Windows with networking support built in was Windows for Workgroups 3.10. The intended audience for this was small businesses who wanted to network their computers together into...
View ArticleWhy does Windows list my SSD system drive as removable?
This has probably happened to you. You right-click the Safely remove hardware and eject media icon, and among the removable devices is your primary hard drive! Surely you can’t eject your primary hard...
View ArticleHow to compare two packed bitfields without having to unpack each field
Suppose you are packing multiple bitfields into a single integer. Let's say you have a 16-bit integer that you have packed three bitfields into: 15 14 13 12 11 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 0 r g b Suppose you...
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