readme.md
June 24, 2026 · View on GitHub
This repo provides a comprehensive set of Rust crates for building Windows applications — from low-level API access to high-level declarative UI.
How these docs are organized
Each crate has one page under crates/ covering both usage and internals — how the crate is built and maintained (the tool_bindings / tool_reactor / tool_package codegen pipeline, generated files, and conventions). Each crate's own readme.md is the user-facing introduction with a quick example, and the per-crate page links to it. Item-level API reference is the generated rustdoc on docs.rs, linked from every page.
Crates
Core & error handling
| Crate | Description |
|---|---|
| windows-core | Fundamental COM and Windows type support. |
| windows-result | Windows error handling and propagation. |
| windows-strings | Windows string interop types and macros. |
Values & collections
| Crate | Description |
|---|---|
| windows-numerics | Graphics math types (vectors and matrices). |
| windows-collections | Stock WinRT collection types. |
| windows-reference | Stock IReference<T> implementation. |
| windows-time | WinRT TimeSpan and DateTime. |
Async & threading
| Crate | Description |
|---|---|
| windows-future | WinRT async bridged to Rust futures. |
| windows-threading | Safe wrapper over the Win32 thread pool. |
System services
| Crate | Description |
|---|---|
| windows-registry | Safe Windows registry access. |
| windows-services | Author Windows services in Rust. |
| windows-version | Query the Windows version at runtime. |
COM macros & linking
| Crate | Description |
|---|---|
| windows-implement | #[implement] proc macro for COM/WinRT. |
| windows-interface | #[interface] proc macro for COM interfaces. |
| windows-link | Raw-dylib import support (link!). |
| windows-targets | Import libs for older compilers. |
UI & graphics
| Crate | Description |
|---|---|
| windows-reactor | Declarative UI library backed by WinUI 3. |
| windows-canvas | 2D graphics built on Direct2D. |
| windows-webview | Safe wrapper around the WebView2 browser control. |
| windows-window | Minimal window creation and message loop. |
| windows-animation | Wrapper around the Windows Animation Manager. |
| windows-reactor-setup | Windows App Runtime installer for reactor apps. |
Codegen & metadata tooling
| Crate | Description |
|---|---|
| windows-bindgen | Code generator for Windows metadata. |
| windows-metadata | Low-level ECMA-335 metadata library. |
| windows-rdl | RDL parser and ECMA-335 generator. |
| riddle | Windows metadata compiler. |
| cppwinrt | Bundles the C++/WinRT compiler. |
Full Windows API projection
These crates project the entire Windows API surface. For new projects, prefer a focused binding generated with windows-bindgen, or compose the smaller crates above.
| Crate | Description |
|---|---|
| windows | Safer projection of C-style, COM, and WinRT APIs. |
| windows-sys | Zero-overhead raw bindings for C-style Windows APIs. |