I think it stands for Microsoft Foundation Classes. That's all I really know about it. Do I have to have VC++ to understand it. Cause when I look at C++ code that says they use that. Its all confusing and wierd. What happened to the win32 API and regular C++. Did I just read a giant book on win32 API after spending 60 bucks. Just to be out mached by a new programming tech.

The Win32 API is a set of C functions for giving commands to the windows OS. The MFC wraps these C function calls into a set of C++ classes to make it object oriented. There is also the .NET framework which is another set of classes for object oriented windows development. Then there is the ATL which I think is a COM object version for doing windows development. Since MFC is a microsoft thing I would assume you need Visual Studio to use it. Even with all these sets of wrappers it is still good to be familiar with the Win32 API since if they don't support a feature of windows you want or don't do it in the way you like you can handle it yourself by going back to the basics.