Chapter 1: Getting Started with the Windows App SDK and WinUI

Windows desktop applications have always played a critical role in the enterprise and productivity space. No matter what you do in your day-to-day job, if you are using a computer in a professional capacity, you are using one or more desktop applications to get your job done – Visual Studio, Office, and Photoshop are just a few of the most famous examples. And let's not forget many of the line-of-business applications that we might use in our everyday jobs to perform tasks such as submitting expense reports or creating financial reports.

Web and mobile devices have certainly changed the ecosystem, and many of these tasks can be performed everywhere nowadays. But this doesn't mean that desktop applications aren't relevant anymore. They still play a critical role in our productivity, thanks to better performance, which makes them the best choice for heavy tasks such as video rendering or graphic design. They are optimized for mouse and keyboard, which is still the primary input method for scenarios such as coding, data entry, and data analysis. They can be deeply integrated with every type of external hardware, such as barcode readers, scanners, and blood sample testers.

For all these reasons, Microsoft continues to heavily invest in the Windows desktop space to provide developers the best platform and tools to create powerful experiences for their customers. And with the release of Windows 11, there's a renewed interest among developers to delight their users with applications that take advantage of the latest innovations in the platform.

In this chapter, we're going to explore the following topics:

• What the Windows App SDK is and how it compares to the other existing development platforms for Windows
• The role of the new .NET runtime
• Choosing the right deployment model for your application
• Creating your first Windows App SDK project
• Managing the relationship between the Windows App SDK and Windows
• Building libraries and components

These topics will set the stage for you to get started with the Windows App SDK and WinUI (the short name for Windows UI Library), which will be useful for the next chapters.