For a person who is far from client development on Windows, all these terms are definitely confused. And even among the MS community, controversy regularly arises whether the UWP is dead or alive. And the main question in this dispute is - what is UWP?
For 3 years already Microsoft has been "refactoring" in its "kingdom". Somewhat tired of seeing the same controversies on Twitter, and leaving the same comments on Habré, I decided to describe how the numerous MS UI frameworks relate to each other. Which of them is more dead. Perhaps this will help someone in choosing a technology for a future project.
Windows API and Windows Runtime
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Application Models
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UI-
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WinUI
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MAUI?
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Similarly, ReactNative for Windows is also an abstraction on top of WinUI. By the way, the store on the Xbox is written on it.
Let's summarize
UWP is the name for a subset of Windows APIs, but is often used as an abbreviation for sandboxed apps that run on this API.
WinUI - modern graphics framework for Windows
Windows App SDK - in the future, a single set of SDKs for any application on Windows, regardless of language, and with the ability to switch between different application lifecycles
MAUI - .NET-tied cross-platform abstraction over native UI