GetVersionEx() depreciated, what should be used instead for Windows 7/8/10?

[Corinna Vinschen]

On Mar 21 09:58, Christian Franke via Cygwin wrote:
> Corinna Vinschen via Cygwin wrote:
> > On Mar 20 12:39, Christian Franke via Cygwin wrote:
> > > Corinna Vinschen via Cygwin wrote:
> > > > You have to create an application with an application manifest not
> > > > supporting your OS.
> > > > 
> > > > For Cygwin apps, this occured when you built, say, an executable under
> > > > Windows 8.1 before Windows 10 support was added to the Cygwin toolchain:
> > > > the manifest linked to the Cygwin executable didn't yet contain a GUID
> > > > entry for Windows 10 support.
> > > > 
> > > > In this case, RtlGetVersion returns an OS version 6.3 even when running
> > > > under the 10.0 kernel.  This behaviour exists back 'til Windows Vista.
> > > Could not reproduce the latter on Win10. I tested with recent Win10 and
> > > Win11 and also found a Win10 1511 (and Slackware 1.1.2, Win3.1, OS/2, ...)
> > > in my VM image museum.
> > > 
> > > Regardless of the exe manifest, RtlGetVersion and RtlGetNtVersionNumbers
> > > return the correct versions:
> > > 10.0.22621 (Win11 22H2)
> > > 10.0.19045 (Win10 22H2)
> > > 10.0.10586 (Win10 1511)
> > > 
> > > Without a manifest, GetVersionEx returns:
> > > 6.2.9200 (Win8)

I just gave it a try on W11. The results are even more funny than I
anticipated:

I created a simple application just calling GetVersionEx, RtlGetVersion
and RtlGetNtVersionNumbers.

Linked with our Cygwin default manifest claiming W10 compatibility, the
result is the expected:

  GetVersionEx          : 10.0.22631
  RtlGetVersion         : 10.0.22631
  RtlGetNtVersionNumbers: 10.0.22631

The "Operating system context" in Task Manager is empty.

Next I linked against a Windows 8.1 manifest:

  GetVersionEx          : 6.3.9600
  RtlGetVersion         : 10.0.22631
  RtlGetNtVersionNumbers: 10.0.22631

So GetVersionEx reports Windows 8.1, RtlGetVersion/ RtlGetNtVersionNumbers
both report W10.  The "Operating system context" in Task Manager reports

  "Windows 8.1"

No surprise there.

Next I linked against a Windows 7 manifest:

  GetVersionEx          : 6.2.9200
  RtlGetVersion         : 10.0.22631
  RtlGetNtVersionNumbers: 10.0.22631

So GetVersionEx reports Windows 8, not Windows 7.

However, the "Operating system context" in Task Manager reports

  "Windows 7"

I also tried this with a Vista manifest:

  GetVersionEx          : 6.2.9200
  RtlGetVersion         : 10.0.22631
  RtlGetNtVersionNumbers: 10.0.22631

  "Windows Vista"

So Task Manager reports the right context per the manifest, but
GetVersionEx doesn't go below Windows 8.

Same goes for Windows 10...

  GetVersionEx          : 6.2.9200
  RtlGetVersion         : 10.0.19045
  RtlGetNtVersionNumbers: 10.0.19045

  "Windows Vista"

as well as for Windows 8.1:

  GetVersionEx          : 6.2.9200
  RtlGetVersion         : 6.3.9600
  RtlGetNtVersionNumbers: 6.3.9600

  "Windows Vista"

So, yeah, with your observations especially on older W10 versions and
with 8.1 doing the same thing, I guess we can safely drop the extra call
to RtlGetNtVersionNumbers now.  After such a long time, I don't know
on which version of Windows we observed the problem.

For those interested in patch forensics, I searched the archives and
came up with two mail threads referring to GetVersionEx and RtlGetVersion:

  https://cygwin.com/pipermail/cygwin/2013-November/211795.html
  https://cygwin.com/pipermail/cygwin/2014-June/215836.html

Unfortunately I found *no* thread talking about RtlGetNtVersionNumbers,
so the only information we have now is the commit message of

  https://cygwin.com/cgit/newlib-cygwin/commit/?id=48511f3d3847c



Thanks,
Corinna