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Universal Windows Platform (UWP)

Triplets

vcpkg includes triplets for building Universal Windows Platform (UWP) applications using the MSVC cl.exe compiler.

Architecture vcpkg triplets Community
x64 x64-uwp
x64-uwp-static-md Yes
x86 x86-uwp Yes
x86-uwp-static-md Yes
arm arm-uwp
arm-uwp-static-md Yes
arm64 arm64-uwp Yes
arm64-uwp-static-md Yes

C++/CX vs. C++/WinRT projections

UWP applications typically consume Windows Runtime APIs, and there are a number of solutions for using these from C++. The C++/CX language extensions for the MSVC compiler (/ZW), the C++/WinRT language projections which works with C++17 compilers, or the Windows Runtime Library.

The UWP triplet toolchain leaves enabling C++/CX language extensions (/ZW) up to CMake, but does provide a /FU parameter to point to the proper platform.winmd file for the toolset being used.

Maintainer notes

CMake projects for these triplets are built using CMAKE_SYSTEM_NAME set to "WindowsStore" and CMAKE_SYSTEM_VERSION set to "10.0".

The UWP triplets also build code using /DWINAPI_FAMILY=WINAPI_FAMILY_APP for the API partition, so libraries can fail to build if they are using unsupported versions of Win32 APIs. The general recommendation is to use the newer APIs in all cases, but if you need to build the same library for older versions of Windows then you may need to use conditionally building code such as the following to support both scenarios.

    HANDLE hFile = nullptr;
#if (_WIN32_WINNT >= _WIN32_WINNT_WIN8)
    hFile = CreateFile2(
                fileName,
                GENERIC_READ, FILE_SHARE_READ, OPEN_EXISTING,
                nullptr);
#else
    hFile = CreateFileW(
                fileName,
                GENERIC_READ, FILE_SHARE_READ,
                nullptr,
                OPEN_EXISTING, FILE_ATTRIBUTE_NORMAL,
                nullptr);
#endif

UWP triplets also build with /DUNICODE /D_UNICODE as these are both strongly recommended for modern development. See the UTF-8 Everywhere manifesto for more information.

Library author notes

For CMake 3.1 or later, you control the enabling of the MSVC C++/CX language extensions (i.e. /ZW) via the VS_WINRT_COMPONENT property for the Visual Studio generator.

If making use of C++/WinRT language projections, leverage the cppwinrt vcpkg port rather than relying on the often outdated headers in the Windows SDK.

if (VCPKG_TOOLCHAIN)
    message(STATUS "Using VCPKG for C++/WinRT.")
    find_package(cppwinrt CONFIG REQUIRED)
    target_link_libraries(${PROJECT_NAME} PRIVATE Microsoft::CppWinRT)
endif()

In your CMakeLists.txt file use something similar to the following to enable the proper build settings for the UWP platform as these are not automatically set by CMake.

if(WIN32)
    target_compile_definitions(${PROJECT_NAME} PRIVATE _UNICODE UNICODE)

    if(WINDOWS_STORE)
        target_compile_definitions(${PROJECT_NAME} PRIVATE WINAPI_FAMILY=WINAPI_FAMILY_APP)
    endif()
endif()

You should set _WIN32_WINNT=0x0A00 (Windows 10 or later) as well for all WIN32 platforms, or at least for WINDOWS_STORE platform builds.

if(WIN32)
    target_compile_definitions(${PROJECT_NAME} PRIVATE _WIN32_WINNT=0x0A00)
endif()

Further reading

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