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A Dart library for accessing common Win32 APIs using FFI. No C required!

Dart/Win32

A package that wraps some of the most common Win32 API calls using FFI to make them accessible to Dart code without requiring a C compiler or the Windows SDK.

pub package Language Build

In addition to exposing the APIs themselves, this package offers a variety of instructive examples for more complex FFI usage scenarios.

By design, this package provides minimal modifications to the Win32 API to support Dart idioms. The goal is to provide high familiarity to an existing Win32 developer. Other Dart packages may build on these primitives to provide a friendly API for Dart and Flutter developers. A good example of that is filepicker_windows, which offers a common item dialog suitable for incorporation into an existing Flutter app.

Usage #

This package lets you write apps that use the Windows API directly from Dart, by wrapping common Win32, COM and Windows Runtime APIs using Dart FFI.

You could use it to call a Win32 API like EnumFontFamiliesEx to enumerate all locally-installed fonts:

Fonts screenshot

or access system information that is not exposed directly by the Dart framework libraries:

System information screenshot

You could use it to build a Windows app with Flutter that relies on Win32 APIs:

Disk explorer screenshot

You could even use it to build a traditional Win32 app, written purely in Dart, that could have come straight out of a classic Charles Petzold book on programming Windows apps:

Dart notepad screenshot

or even, perhaps, a fully-fledged game using GDI:

Dart Tetris for Win32 screenshot

You might even build a package that depends upon it, like dart_console, which enables advanced console manipulation:

Dart console ANSI color demo screenshot

or filepicker_windows, which provides a modern Windows file picker for Flutter:

Windows file picker screenshot

Getting started #

Many more samples can be found in the example\ subdirectory, along with a test suite in the test\ subdirectory that shows other API calls.

A good starting point is hello.dart. This example demonstrates creating a Win32 window and responding to common messages such as WM_PAINT through a WindowProc callback function.

To run it, type:

dart example\hello.dart

This should display a window with a text message.

This can be compiled into a standalone Win32 executable by running:

dart compile exe example\hello.dart -o example\bin\hello.exe

For more information on working with the Win32 library from Dart, consult the documentation, in particular the sections on string manipulation and COM objects.

Samples #

The package includes a number of examples in the example subdirectory. These examples use the Win32 API for all UI display and (unless mentioned) do not require Flutter.

Example Description
hello.dart Basic Petzoldian "hello world" Win32 app
bluetooth.dart Demonstrate enumerating Bluetooth devices
bluetoothle.dart Enumerate Bluetooth LE (Low Energy) devices
calendar.dart Gets information about the calendar from a WinRT API
console.dart Shows usage of console APIs
credentials.dart Adds a credential to the store and retrieves it
customtitlebar.dart Demonstrates creation of owner-draw title bar region
customwin.dart Displays a non-rectangular window
devices.dart Uses volume management APIs to list all disk devices
dialog.dart Create a custom dialog box in code
dialogshow.dart Creates a common item dialog (file picker) using COM
diskinfo.dart Use DeviceIoControl() for direct device operations
dump.dart Use debugger libraries to print DLL exported functions
dynamic_load.dart Demonstrate loading a DLL and calling it at runtime
explorer\ Example Flutter app that uses Win32 file picker APIs
filever.dart Getting file version information from the file resource
gamepad.dart Show which gamepads are connected
guid.dart Creates a globally unique identifier (GUID)
idispatch.dart Demonstrates calling a method using IDispatch
knownfolder.dart Retrieves known folders from the current user profile
magnifier.dart Provides a magnifier window using the Magnification API
manifest\ Demonstrates the use of app manifests for compiled apps
midi.dart Demonstrates MIDI playback using MCI commands
modules.dart Enumerates all loaded modules on the current system
monitor.dart Uses DDC and monitor-config API to get monitor caps
msgbox.dart Demonstrates a MessageBox from the console
notepad\ Lightweight replica of the Windows notepad applet
paint.dart Demonstrates simple GDI drawing and min/max window sizing
pipe.dart Shows use of named pipes for interprocess communication
play_sound.dart Plays a WAV file through the Windows PlaySound API
printer_list.dart Enumerate available printers on the Windows system
registry.dart Demonstrates querying the registry for values
screenshot.dart Takes a screenshot of the current desktop
scroll.dart Example of horizontal and vertical scrolling text window
sendinput.dart Sends keyboard and mouse input to another window
serial.dart Demonstrates serial port management
setupapi.dart Show using setup APIs to retrieve device interfaces
shortcut.dart Demonstrates creating a Windows shell link
snake.dart Snake game using various GDI features
speech.dart Use Windows speech engine for text-to-speech
sysinfo.dart Examples of getting device information from native C APIs
taskdialog.dart Demonstrates using modern task dialog boxes
tetris\main.dart Port of an open-source Tetris game to Dart
vt.dart Shows virtual terminal sequences
wallpaper.dart Shows what wallpaper and background color are set
wasapi.dart Demonstrates sound generation with WASAPI library
window.dart Enumerates open windows and basic window manipulation
winmd.dart Interrogate Windows Runtime types
wmi_perf.dart Uses WMI to retrieve performance counters
wmi_wql.dart Uses WMI to retrieve information using WQL
wsl.dart Retrieve information from a WSL instance through APIs

Packages built on win32 #

There are a small but growing set of packages that build on the relatively low-level APIs exposed by the Dart win32 package to provide more idiomatic class wrappers. These packages typically don't require any knowledge of Windows programming models or FFI, and are ideal for incorporation into Flutter apps for Windows.

Specifically, this includes:

  • dart_console: provides Dart libraries for building TUIs (terminal UIs) or console apps that use more than the stdin/stdout services provided by Dart itself.
  • device_info_plus_windows: provides information about the characteristics of the current device.
  • filepicker_windows: makes the Windows file open / save common dialog boxes available to Flutter and Dart apps.
  • path_provider_windows: provides a way for Dart apps to find common Windows file locations (such as the documents directory).
  • win32_registry: provides Dart classes for accessing and manipulating the Windows registry.
  • win32_runner: provides an experimental shell (or runner) for hosting Flutter apps without needing a C++ compiler to create the EXE.

Requirements #

This package assumes the Dart 64-bit compiler, running on Windows. Many commands are tested on 32-bit Windows, but due to the lack of a compiler for 32-bit executables and the increasing lack of machines running 32-bit OSes, this is inevitably a low priority. The package is also tested on Windows-on-ARM architecture, running in x64 emulation mode.

Features and bugs #

The current package only projects a subset of the Win32 API, but new APIs will be added based on user demand. I'm particularly interested in unblocking the creation of new Dart packages for Windows. Please file feature requests and bugs at the issue tracker.

Backwards compatibility #

The library version tries to model semver, but you should not assume a strict guarantee of no breaking changes between minor versions. That guarantee is not possible to make, for several reasons:

  • Several times, my fixing a bug in the fidelity of the Win32 API has tightened the constraints over a parameter (for example, Pointer becomes Pointer<INPUT>). These changes should be signalled in the log.
  • Adding new features may itself cause a breaking change. For example, if you declare a missing Windows constant in your own code that is then added, Dart will complain about the duplicate definition.

One solution is to pin to a specific version of Win32, or declare a more tightly-bounded version dependency (e.g. '>=1.7.0 <1.8.0' rather than merely ^1.7.0). But the best approach is simply to test regularly with the latest version of this package, and continue to move your minimum forward. As the package matures, these issues should gradually fade away.

Acknowledgements #

The Tetris example listed above is a fuller worked example of a reasonably complete program that uses the Dart Win32 package. It is a port of a C version of the game by Chang-Hung Liang. More information...

The C implementation of Snake is by David Jones, and is ported with his permission.

The original C version of the Notepad example was authored by Charles Petzold, and is kindly licensed by him without restriction.

The original C version of the custom title bar example is by Dmitriy Kubyshkin and is licensed by him under the MIT License.

The summary Win32 API documentation comments are licensed by Microsoft under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License.

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A Dart library for accessing common Win32 APIs using FFI. No C required!

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