There is absolutely NOTHING wrong with using an existing skeleton to work off of. The common files provided by Microsoft, can be used as a basis for designing a full engine.

It doesn''t mean you''re using it because you''re "lazy".. that''s a really horrible point of view. You use it to help for 2 reasons: A> you want to go through it yourself to learn faster what they have done, or B> you already know the basic initializations of DX, and would like to get down to the real programming already. Why rewrite code that you would wind up writing similar the same yourself, if you know it.

I''m not saying to just use it if you don''t know DX all that well, but if you have been coding DX for awhile, it makes it easier to have something to work off of.

-Zawinul