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The Build pages tell you how to use the Desktop SDK to access the accounting capabilities of QuickBooks Desktop. Browse the full list of topics in the table of contents on the left side of this page.
Listed here are some essential topics you might want to get to quickly.
Applications that integrate with QuickBooks via the Desktop SDK make use of runtime support components that are part of a QuickBooks Desktop installation. Understanding how this works will help you use the SDK effectively. Communicating with QuickBooks has full details.
One basic task for any application using the SDK is connecting to QuickBooks and getting authorized to access one or more QuickBooks company files. Connections, sessions and authorizations has full details.
The Desktop SDK communicates with QuickBooks Desktop with messages that are in a version of XML called qbXML. Your application will use the Desktop SDK to send qbXML requests to QuickBooks and receive qbXML responses. For detailed information on the basics of exchanging messages with QuickBooks, including query messages and report messages, see the pages in Exploring the QuickBooks Desktop SDK.
For detailed information on using specific features provided by the SDK, see the pages in Tutorials.
For a description of what is installed with the SDK, including developer tools such as SDKTestPlus3 and the qbXML Validator see Desktop SDK components.
For a list of sample applications and code available for the Desktop SDK, see Sample applications and code.
You might also be interested in the Third-party tools that other developers have created to support the Desktop SDK.