A few years ago I wrote a program in C++ to generate invoices from my employees' Outlook calendars. I'm by no means a programmer and only have very rudimentary C++ chops, but it works perfectly and I've used it every week since then. I compiled it with Visual C++ 2010. It of course runs on my system because I have Visual C++ 2010 installed. I'm in the process of transferring all of my business stuff over to my new laptop so I can use my desktop exclusively for music, and I don't particularly want to install Visual C++ 2010 on there. Can I just install the Visual C++ 2010 Redistributable on my laptop to make my executable run? Sorry if this is an obvious question, I was never that clear about the whole nuts and bolts of C++ compiling. 
 
Also, I notice that Microsoft's list of requirements for the 2010 redistributable does not include Windows 8, but that the 2013 redistributable does. Will there be a problem installing 2010 on my Windows 8 machine, or is the 2013 version backwards compatible? Thanks for any help 

Hmm...  I can't think of any reason why binaries created in a Windows environment with 2010 won't work in Windows 8 as long as you install the Redistributable for 2010 (which has the packages required).  Now deployment from 2010 and using the 2013 Redistributable might be a problem since there's usually big differences internally between major versions.
 
Is it a big hassle to simply try it?

The 2010 runtime should install into win8 with no problems.

Karyn
The 2010 runtime should install into win8 with no problems.

Too bad you can't always say the same for Windows 8 itself! 

craigb
Hmm...  I can't think of any reason why binaries created in a Windows environment with 2010 won't work in Windows 8 as long as you install the Redistributable for 2010 (which has the packages required).  Now deployment from 2010 and using the 2013 Redistributable might be a problem since there's usually big differences internally between major versions.
 
Is it a big hassle to simply try it?

 
Not really, I would just prefer some expert advice before I start installing and/or uninstalling different redistributables. I have that some-would-say irrational new laptop caution 

Karyn
The 2010 runtime should install into win8 with no problems.

Thanks I'll give it a go. Bugs me though when Microsoft doesn't update its spec information to include new OS's. 

It's hard enough to get Microsquish to update their products let alone their documentation - lol.

craigb
It's hard enough to get Microsquish to update their products let alone their documentation - lol.

It's not just Microsoft. Companies release drastically new versions of their software and don't even bother updating the manual. Native Instruments still haven't updated the Reaktor manual despite the fact that many of the options and UI elements have completely changed. Bad documentation is one of my pet peeves...

Well I tried installing the 2010 redistributable but it wouldn't let me because it said there was a newer version on my system. So I tried running my executable anyway and it said that I am missing MSVCR100D.dll, the 'D' suffix of which I believe indicates it's a debug version of MSVCR100.dll. Does this mean that I didn't compile it in release mode or something? 

Yep, MSVCR100D.dll is the debug version.  I'm guessing you could either compile a release version or just copy the missing library to the same directory as the non-debug version?