Dialog Boxes in MFC C++

Question

I have 4 Dialog Boxes in 1 Project. Let's call them

IDD_DIALOG1
IDD_DIALOG2
IDD_DIALOG3
IDD_DIALOG4

When I compile my program the first window/dialog box I can see is IDD_DIALOG1, but I want to have IDD_DIALOG2 first. My project do not have something like WinMain. It's clear MFC Application.

Look at the source. MFC has marked IDD_DIALOG1 in some way to be lauched. Change that. (Try searching for all references to IDD_DIALOG1 in your source.) — Martin Bonner supports Monica
Can somebody make new Project, create second dialog box and try to set that second dialog as first, main one. I have looked to whole project and didn't see a place to change that. Any idea? — Anthony Martial
You need Programming Windows with MFC. It teaches you how to write MFC code without an IDE. Right now you seem to think that the IDE does some sort of magic. This is not the case. — IInspectable

Andrew Truckle Andrew Truckle · Accepted Answer · 2016-05-24T15:59:26

When you create your project you will have an application class too. In this class there will already be a default InitInstance method. For example:

BOOL CMFCApplication1App::InitInstance()
{
    // InitCommonControlsEx() is required on Windows XP if an application
    // manifest specifies use of ComCtl32.dll version 6 or later to enable
    // visual styles.  Otherwise, any window creation will fail.
    INITCOMMONCONTROLSEX InitCtrls;
    InitCtrls.dwSize = sizeof(InitCtrls);
    // Set this to include all the common control classes you want to use
    // in your application.
    InitCtrls.dwICC = ICC_WIN95_CLASSES;
    InitCommonControlsEx(&InitCtrls);

    CWinApp::InitInstance();


    AfxEnableControlContainer();

    // Create the shell manager, in case the dialog contains
    // any shell tree view or shell list view controls.
    CShellManager *pShellManager = new CShellManager;

    // Activate "Windows Native" visual manager for enabling themes in MFC controls
    CMFCVisualManager::SetDefaultManager(RUNTIME_CLASS(CMFCVisualManagerWindows));

    // Standard initialization
    // If you are not using these features and wish to reduce the size
    // of your final executable, you should remove from the following
    // the specific initialization routines you do not need
    // Change the registry key under which our settings are stored
    // TODO: You should modify this string to be something appropriate
    // such as the name of your company or organization
    SetRegistryKey(_T("Local AppWizard-Generated Applications"));

    CMFCApplication1Dlg dlg;
    m_pMainWnd = &dlg;
    INT_PTR nResponse = dlg.DoModal();
    if (nResponse == IDOK)
    {
        // TODO: Place code here to handle when the dialog is
        //  dismissed with OK
    }
    else if (nResponse == IDCANCEL)
    {
        // TODO: Place code here to handle when the dialog is
        //  dismissed with Cancel
    }
    else if (nResponse == -1)
    {
        TRACE(traceAppMsg, 0, "Warning: dialog creation failed, so application is terminating unexpectedly.\n");
        TRACE(traceAppMsg, 0, "Warning: if you are using MFC controls on the dialog, you cannot #define _AFX_NO_MFC_CONTROLS_IN_DIALOGS.\n");
    }

    // Delete the shell manager created above.
    if (pShellManager != NULL)
    {
        delete pShellManager;
    }

    // Since the dialog has been closed, return FALSE so that we exit the
    //  application, rather than start the application's message pump.
    return FALSE;
}

Part way down that method is this code:

CMFCApplication1Dlg dlg;
m_pMainWnd = &dlg;
INT_PTR nResponse = dlg.DoModal();

That is the main code you are interested in. So, if you want to start with a different dialogue, then #include the right header and change the code to the different dialogue class.

So in the above example, CMFCApplication1Dlg would be changed to something else, eg: CMyDialog2 (I do not know what the names of your dialogue classes are).

Dialog Boxes in MFC C++

1 Answers