Programming Windows
Programming Windows by Charles Petzoldby Charles Petzold
Hacker ApprovedRanked 9 of 115 programming books by recommenders
People recommend it as a thorough, well-written guide to Win32 programming that many learned from directly. The most common caveat is that it takes a long time to work through.
People recommend it as a thorough, well-written guide to Win32 programming that many learned from directly. The most common caveat is that it takes a long time to work through.
14 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 14
- criticize it
- 0
- approval share
- 100%
Recommended in 7 of 13 months
- November 2025: not recommended
- December 2025: not recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: not recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: not recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: not recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Why it carries the badge
- 14 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- Nobody criticizes itNeeds 2 to 1 or better, met.
- Recommended in 7 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Thorough and well written
“devoted an entire chapter (chapter 7) to memory management, with diagrams and examples”
Comment from 7 Jun 2026 in “Win16 Memory Management” “PLENTY of very thorough documentation (Petzold's "Programming Windows"!)”
Comment from 3 Mar 2026 in “The beauty and terror of modding Windows” “His book was a shining example of how good a programming book could be.”
Comment from 27 May 2026 in “Ask HN: What old developer tool do you still miss?” - Comment from 29 Jan 2026 in “Winapp, the Windows App Development CLI – Windows Developer Blog”
Taught Win32 programming to readers
“It was a matter of having access to the right (although limited) resources such as Petzold’s book, Codeproject and experimentation.”
Comment from 23 Mar 2026 in “Windows native app development is a mess” “I practically had the Charles Petzold Programming Windows book memorized back in the day”
Comment from 26 Sep 2026 in “What even is an OS now?” “It is a fantastic book, I learned everything I know on Win32 from it.”
Comment from 6 Apr 2026 in “Microsoft Hasn't Had a Coherent GUI Strategy Since Petzold” - Comment from 4 Jan 2026 in “Swift on Android: Full Native App Development Now Possible”
Canonical reference from a respected author
“Charles Petzold wrote the canonical reference works for programming Win32 and MFC.”
Comment from 15 Mar 2026 in “The Appalling Stupidity of Spotify's AI DJ” “Petzold's famous book on the subject, published by Microsoft Press itself”
Comment from 21 Mar 2026 in “Windows 11's Start menu was built using React – now switching to native WinUI”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
Slow going, takes a while
“Took awhile to grind through it.”
Comment from 5 Apr 2026 in “Microsoft Hasn't Had a Coherent GUI Strategy Since Petzold”
Other programming books people recommend
The four most recommended other programming books, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Crafting Interpretersby Robert Nystrom | 60 | 4 | 94% | 10 | — | Approved |
| Clean Codeby Robert C. Martin | 31 | 87 | 26% | 9 | — | — |
| The Pragmatic Programmerby Hunt and Thomas | 28 | 1 | 97% | 7 | — | Approved |
| How to Design Programsby Felleisen, Findler, Flatt and Krishnamurthi | 18 | 2 | 90% | 7 | — | Approved |
| Programming Windowsby Charles PetzoldThis page | 14 | 0 | 100% | 7 | — | Approved |
What people said
14 of the 16 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“I practically had the Charles Petzold Programming Windows book memorized back in the day”
“so much bullshit boilerplate was required to get a GUI up on a OS literally named after its GUI windows”
“devoted an entire chapter (chapter 7) to memory management, with diagrams and examples”
“His book was a shining example of how good a programming book could be.”
“It is a fantastic book, I learned everything I know on Win32 from it.”
“Took awhile to grind through it.”
“Pretty much everything in there still works, if I type it in and compile it with the current Visual C/C++ toolchain.”
“It was a matter of having access to the right (although limited) resources such as Petzold’s book, Codeproject and experimentation.”
“Petzold's famous book on the subject, published by Microsoft Press itself”
“Charles Petzold wrote the canonical reference works for programming Win32 and MFC.”
“PLENTY of very thorough documentation (Petzold's "Programming Windows"!)”
“those books look really thorough and well written”
“the good ones back in the day”
“and Petzold's book to follow along”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.