Beginner Question: CreateWindowEx Fails.

Hi folks

I'm only a learner. Been working through The Forgers WinAPI tutorial and sorting errors I make as I go along is a great way to learn. But now I'm a bit stumped.

I've got a program that compiles, RegisterClassEx goes OK, but CreateWindowEx fails - and I can't for the life of me see why :confused:

Can anyone point me in the direction of how to debug this kind of problem? I tried using GetLastError() to find more info, but silly me, I don't even know how to display the Integer it returns in a Message Box.

I don't mind working things through for myself but would appreciate a little help with this one.

Thanks in Advance

dicky

>>> how to display the Integer it returns in a Message Box.

Code:

---

#include <stdio.h>
...
char Error[10];
int LastError;
...
LastError = GetLastError();
sprintf(Error, "%d", LastError);
MessageBox(NULL, Error, "Error is", MB_OK);

---

Or use something like this(not my code, author unknown):

Code:

---

#include <windows.h>
#include <stdarg.h>
#include <stdio.h>
#include <tchar.h>

int CDECL MessageBoxPrintf (TCHAR * szFormat, ...)
{
    TCHAR  szBuffer [1024] ;
    va_list pArgList ;

    va_start (pArgList, szFormat) ;

    _vsntprintf (szBuffer, sizeof (szBuffer) / sizeof (TCHAR),
                  szFormat, pArgList) ;

    szBuffer[(sizeof (szBuffer) / sizeof (TCHAR)) - 1] = TEXT('\0') ;

    va_end (pArgList) ;

    return MessageBox (NULL, szBuffer, TEXT("Debug Message"), 0) ;
}

---

Code:

---

MessageBoxPrintf("The error returned was %d.", GetLastError());

---

EDIT:
Nul termination added as pointed out by JasonD.

The code may have been taken from Petzold. Here is his code:

Code:

---

int CDECL MessageBoxPrintf (TCHAR * szCaption, TCHAR * szFormat, ...)
{
    TCHAR  szBuffer [1024] ;
    va_list pArgList ;

          // The va_start macro (defined in STDARG.H) is usually equivalent to:
          // pArgList = (char *) &szFormat + sizeof (szFormat) ;

    va_start (pArgList, szFormat) ;

          // The last argument to wvsprintf points to the arguments

    _vsntprintf (szBuffer, sizeof (szBuffer) / sizeof (TCHAR),
                  szFormat, pArgList) ;

          // The va_end macro just zeroes out pArgList for no good reason

    va_end (pArgList) ;

    return MessageBox (NULL, szBuffer, szCaption, 0) ;
}

---

Notice that this code avoids buffer overflow by using the _vsntprintf function with appropriate use of the sizeof operator. However, the above code is not perfect, as it does not guarantee NULL termination. So, you should force this yourself by setting the last character in szBuffer to NULL. That reminds me, I should add this to my errata list for Programming Windows...

Thanks for the help guys - I did sort out the problem with my program.

It turned out not to be that CreateWindowEx was failing as such.

Actually I had some error in the structure of a Switch statement that was above this part of my source code (curly braces and break; statements in the wrong order) and that was causing the problem - I think my program was kinda "falling" out of the Windows Procedure section and into the create window section. Anyway I learned some more by the time I fixed it :)

dicky