I downloaded the Platform SDK, and I noticed that there is a little "Register PSDK Directories with Visual Studio" program that came with it. I was hoping that this would update the options for my already-existing installation of MSVC++ Express, but it hasn't seemed to have done anything. So, I figured, in order to use MFC I'm going to have edit the options manually. One thing that struck me is that, if I specify C:\Program Files\Microsoft Platform SDK\Include, then I can use any of the header files in that directory, but none of the files in any of its subdirectories. The problem is that there are like 15 subdirectories. Do I have to add each one? It's not a big deal if I do, it just seems inelegant. Also, I was hoping there would be some new project options. Right now, I have no options for an MFC project. I suppose I could just start a Win32 project and then code everything by hand, but it would be nice to be able to use the AppWizards and stuff. Is this stuff not included with the Express edition?

Actually, i think that's one of the limitations of the Express edition. Look over those one more time, I could be wrong.

That actually leads me to my next problem. It actually did come with some MFC stuff in Include\mfc. I was able to include afxwin.h in my project. The problem is that I tried to derive a class from CWinApp, and just to check and see, I right-clicked on CWinApp and click "Go to Declaration" and it said "Symbol is not defined."

Arrgh! I wish I wasn't such a noob.