List of Microsoft Windows application programming interfaces and frameworks

The following is a list of Microsoft APIs and frameworks.

Current

 * Component Model
 * ActiveX (while not supported in the default web browser Microsoft Edge)
 * Component Object Model (COM)
 * Distributed Component Object Model (DCOM)
 * COM+
 * Microsoft Data Access Components (MDAC), including: OLE DB
 * Cryptographic API (CAPICOM)
 * ActiveX Data Objects (ADO)
 * Collaboration Data Objects (CDO);
 * Windows Runtime (WinRT)
 * Universal Windows Platform (UWP)
 * DirectShow
 * DirectX
 * Direct2D
 * Direct3D
 * DirectDraw
 * DirectInput
 * DirectMusic
 * DirectPlay
 * DirectSetup
 * DirectSound
 * DirectWrite
 * XACT (Cross-platform Audio Creation Tool)
 * XAudio 2
 * Media Foundation (Windows Vista / Windows 7)
 * Interface
 * Graphics Device Interface (GDI) and GDI+
 * Application Programming Interface (API)
 * Messaging Application Programming Interface (MAPI)
 * Remote Application Programming Interface (RAPI)
 * Speech Application Programming Interface (SAPI)
 * Telephony Application Programming Interface (TAPI)
 * Extensible Storage Engine (Jet Blue)
 * Object linking and embedding (OLE)
 * OLE Automation
 * Uniscribe (see Template:Microsoft APIs section: Software Factories)
 * Windows Image Acquisition (WIA)
 * Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI)
 * Winsock
 * Win32 console
 * Windows API (current versions: Win32; Win64)

Deprecated

 * Active Scripting
 * Collaboration Data Objects for Windows NT Server
 * Dynamic Data Exchange
 * Older data access technologies
 * Jet Database Engine
 * Data object
 * Jet Data Access Objects
 * Remote Data Objects (RDO)
 * Remote Data Services (RDS)
 * Setup API
 * Windows API (old versions: Win16; Win32s)
 * XNA libraries for cross platform Xbox 360/Windows development

Frameworks

 * .NET Framework
 * Remoting, Assemblies, Metadata
 * Common Language Runtime, Common Type System, Global Assembly Cache, Microsoft Intermediate Language, Windows Forms
 * ADO.NET, ASP.NET
 * Windows Communication Foundation (WCF)
 * Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF)
 * Windows Workflow Foundation (WF)
 * Windows CardSpace (WCS)
 * Universal Windows Platform (UWP)
 * Windows PowerShell
 * Microsoft Management Console (MMC)
 * Text Services Framework
 * Windows Driver Model
 * Windows Driver Foundation

Libraries

 * Microsoft Foundation Class Library (MFC)
 * Active Template Library (ATL)
 * Framework Class Library (FCL)
 * Object Windows Library (OWL)
 * Standard Template Library (STL)
 * Visual Component Library (VCL)
 * Windows Template Library (WTL)
 * Windows UI Library (WinUI)
 * Text Object Model (TOM)