窗口的parent 和 owner 区别

Q: What is a top-level window?

A : A  top-level window  is a window that is not  child , i.e. it has not WS_CHILD style set.
Notes

• unlike the child windows, a top-level window can be displayed anywhere in the screen;
• many definitions state that a top-level window is "a window that has no parent"; 
  that is correct but can lead in a confusion: many people think that every window which is created passing a valid hWndParent in CreateWindow(Ex) "has a parent" then, according to the definition it is not top-level; 
  in fact hWndParent may be either a handle to parent or owner window; 
  if hWndParent is a valid window handle and WS_CHILD style is not set, then we have a top-level owned window;
• a top-level window can or can not be owned but is never a child; further we can say that it can have an owner but never has aparent.
• top-level windows can be either overlapped windows (having WS_OVERLAPPED style and generally used as application main window) or popup windows (having WS_POPUP style, usually temporary windows like message boxes and dialogs);
• the coordinates used in CreateWindow(Ex), MoveWindow, SetWindowPos, and so on are always scren coordinates (relative to top-left corner of the screen).

Examples

Code:

// create a top-level window (not owned)
HWND hWnd = CreateWindow(szWindowClass, szTitle, 
              WS_OVERLAPPED, // WS_CHILD style is not set, so it's a top-level window.
              CW_USEDEFAULT, 0, CW_USEDEFAULT, 0, 
              NULL,          // no handle to the owner, so it's not owned.
              NULL, hInstance, NULL);

Code:

// create a top-level window (owned)
HWND hWnd = CreateWindow(szWindowClass, szTitle, 
              WS_OVERLAPPED, // WS_CHILD style is not set, so it's a top-level window
              CW_USEDEFAULT, 0, CW_USEDEFAULT, 0, 
              hWndParent,    // handle to the owner, so it's an owned window
              NULL, hInstance, NULL);

child window

A window that has the WS_CHILD style. A child window always appears within the client area of its parent window. 

GetParent  

The GetParent function retrieves a handle to the specified window's parent or owner. 

If the window is a child window, the return value is a handle to the parent window. If the window is a top-level window, the return value is a handle to the owner window

CWnd::GetOwner

Retrieves a pointer to the owner of the window. If the window has no owner, then a pointer to the parent window object is returned by default. Note that the relationship between the owner and the owned differs from the parent-child aspect in several important aspects. For example, a window with a parent is confined to its parent window’s client area. Owned windows can be drawn at any location on the desktop.