I would recommend reading a book on C++ before you go any further, as it would be helpful to get a firmer footing. Accelerated C++ by Koenig and Moo is excellent.
To get the executable path use GetModuleFileName:
TCHAR buffer[MAX_PATH] = { 0 };
GetModuleFileName( NULL, buffer, MAX_PATH );
Here’s a C++ function that gets the directory without the file name:
#include <windows.h>
#include <string>
#include <iostream>
std::wstring ExePath() {
TCHAR buffer[MAX_PATH] = { 0 };
GetModuleFileName( NULL, buffer, MAX_PATH );
std::wstring::size_type pos = std::wstring(buffer).find_last_of(L"\\/");
return std::wstring(buffer).substr(0, pos);
}
int main() {
std::cout << "my directory is " << ExePath() << "\n";
}