Sometimes you just need a refreshing taste of a new operating system to remind you that you're an incompetent programmer, because there's just nothing like an entirely new, and poorly documented API, to say; "Hey, you're looking quite confident there, how about now?".
After almost a month with Windows 8 I have just rendered my first bitmap using DirectX 11.1's Direct2D API's. How bloody fantastic. Considering that the page with which I would have relied on to help me out on this at the time of writing says:
This material is not yet available. This placeholder topic is provided as an example of documentation that may be included in a later release.
I figured that I was pretty much on my own. Now of course; Microsoft offered some samples to help me out, once you can actually find them buried in the overly-complex web of documentation that is MSDN. Sure, these samples are pretty good, it's just a shame that most things are left uncommented, and the corresponding web-page that provides the sample is almost always lacking any relevant information as to what is even going on.
Before this turns into a rant about Microsoft, I do honestly believe that most of my frustration is down to me, and my obvious lack of experience. I have never dealt much with DirectX in the first place, and the amount of times that I have developed for any operating system other than Windows 7 is 0. Actually, that's not entirely true, I did have the not-so-lovely task of programming in UnrealScript for an iOS device in the past. Regardless, I entirely acknowledge there is not too much more that Microsoft could have done for me.
The picture above, as you may have guessed, is the result of a couple of weeks worth of research and experimentation. Centred in a currently white window is an insignificantly tiny Windows icon. I have rendered the symbolisation of the bane of my time spent rendering that symbolisation. Surely this is irony, and if it's not, I don't care.
To be perfectly honest, I genuinely think that Windows 8 is an utterly beautiful new redesign, and the ambitions with how Metro apps should be seems admirable. The consistency that Microsoft are striving for is fantastic; I could talk endlessly about what I feel they are doing right. Perhaps in a future blog post I shall. For now though, I think I would just like to hear some other opinions on peoples experiences with this new OS. Perhaps I'm just being even more melodramatic than I think, but that's nothing new.