How to use the Windows API in MinGW?

Question

How to use the Windows API in MinGW?

Answer 1

I occasionally use the Windows API for Qt apps that I build using Qt Creator/MinGW - I just #include the appropriate Windows SDK header (the headers come with MinGW) and it just works. However, you may need to #define a few things in order that some API calls are exposed. For example, I recently needed to call SHGetSpecialFolderPath (found in shlobj.h) but needed to define _WIN32_IE to 0x0400 first.