CreateDCW function (wingdi.h)
The CreateDC function creates a device context (DC) for a device using the specified name.
Syntax
HDC CreateDCW(
LPCWSTR pwszDriver,
[in] LPCWSTR pwszDevice,
LPCWSTR pszPort,
[in] const DEVMODEW *pdm
);
Parameters
pwszDriver
A pointer to a null-terminated character string that specifies either DISPLAY or the name of a specific display device. For printing, we recommend that you pass NULL to lpszDriver because GDI ignores lpszDriver for printer devices.
[in] pwszDevice
A pointer to a null-terminated character string that specifies the name of the specific output device being used, as shown by the Print Manager (for example, Epson FX-80). It is not the printer model name. The lpszDevice parameter must be used.
To obtain valid names for displays, call EnumDisplayDevices.
If lpszDriver is DISPLAY or the device name of a specific display device, then lpszDevice must be NULL or that same device name. If lpszDevice is NULL, then a DC is created for the primary display device.
If there are multiple monitors on the system, calling CreateDC(TEXT("DISPLAY"),NULL,NULL,NULL) will create a DC covering all the monitors.
pszPort
This parameter is ignored and should be set to NULL. It is provided only for compatibility with 16-bit Windows.
[in] pdm
A pointer to a DEVMODE structure containing device-specific initialization data for the device driver. The DocumentProperties function retrieves this structure filled in for a specified device. The pdm parameter must be NULL if the device driver is to use the default initialization (if any) specified by the user.
If lpszDriver is DISPLAY, pdm must be NULL; GDI then uses the display device's current DEVMODE.
Return value
If the function succeeds, the return value is the handle to a DC for the specified device.
If the function fails, the return value is NULL.
Remarks
Note that the handle to the DC can only be used by a single thread at any one time.
For parameters lpszDriver and lpszDevice, call EnumDisplayDevices to obtain valid names for displays.
When you no longer need the DC, call the DeleteDC function.
If lpszDriver or lpszDevice is DISPLAY, the thread that calls CreateDC owns the HDC that is created. When this thread is destroyed, the HDC is no longer valid. Thus, if you create the HDC and pass it to another thread, then exit the first thread, the second thread will not be able to use the HDC.
When you call CreateDC to create the HDC for a display device, you must pass to pdm either NULL or a pointer to DEVMODE that matches the current DEVMODE of the display device that lpszDevice specifies. We recommend to pass NULL and not to try to exactly match the DEVMODE for the current display device.
When you call CreateDC to create the HDC for a printer device, the printer driver validates the DEVMODE. If the printer driver determines that the DEVMODE is invalid (that is, printer driver can’t convert or consume the DEVMODE), the printer driver provides a default DEVMODE to create the HDC for the printer device.
ICM: To enable ICM, set the dmICMMethod member of the DEVMODE structure (pointed to by the pInitData parameter) to the appropriate value.
Examples
For an example, see Capturing an Image.
Note
The wingdi.h header defines CreateDC as an alias which automatically selects the ANSI or Unicode version of this function based on the definition of the UNICODE preprocessor constant. Mixing usage of the encoding-neutral alias with code that not encoding-neutral can lead to mismatches that result in compilation or runtime errors. For more information, see Conventions for Function Prototypes.
Requirements
| Requirement | Value |
|---|---|
| Minimum supported client | Windows 2000 Professional [desktop apps only] |
| Minimum supported server | Windows 2000 Server [desktop apps only] |
| Target Platform | Windows |
| Header | wingdi.h (include Windows.h) |
| Library | Gdi32.lib |
| DLL | Gdi32.dll |