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To help you get started with developing drivers for Windows Vista, the Windows Driver Kit Beta 1 is included, along with beta releases of the Platform SDK and Internet Explorer.
Windows Vista™ (formerly codenamed Windows "Longhorn") is a substantial advance in Windows, with significant innovations in the developer platform. For driver developers, the Windows Driver Kit (WDK) represents a new approach to the traditional driver development kits provided by Microsoft. The WDK takes the functionality presented by the Driver Development Kit (DDK), Installable File System Kit (IFS), Display Compatibility Test Kit (DCT), and Hardware Compatibility Tests (HCT) and combines them into a unified product. The WDK provides driver-specific headers, libraries, sources, tools, and documentation that you need to develop drivers for Windows Vista, Windows Server™ 2003, Windows XP, and Windows 2000.
For example, you can use the Beta 1 version of the WDK to:
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Develop all WDM audio drivers for Windows 2000 and later versions. This version of WDK contains recent changes and fixes, and we recommend that you use the WDK to rebuild WDMD Audio drivers for Windows Server 2003, Windows XP, and Windows 2000. See the WDK documentation for details.
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Find buffer overflows easily. The WDK enables the /Gs compiler option for both free and checked drivers that you build in the Windows Vista and Windows Server 2003 build environments. This compiler option implements stack buffer overflow checking. See the WDK Beta 1 release notes for details.
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Identify obsolete functions in your driver. A feature in the Windows Vista and Windows Server 2003 build environments causes the compiler to generate a warning message whenever particular obsolete functions or macros from Ntddk.h are referenced. See the WDK Beta 1 release notes for details.
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Test drivers during development and test phases using new tools now available from within the WDK build environment. See ..\bin\selfsign\selfsign_readme.doc after you install the Beta 1 WDK.
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The Beta 1 release of the WDK also includes a preview version of the Driver Test Manager (DTM). DTM is an automated, deployable framework that provides complete support for automating Windows-based driver and hardware testing. It is especially for those of you who use the WDK to test, validate, and qualify drivers. See the presentation on the DTM from WinHEC 2005.
If you are ready to start building drivers with the WDK, download the Windows Longhorn Beta 1 Symbols. The entire set of symbols for Windows Vista—as well as Windows Server 2003, Windows XP and Windows 2000—can be downloaded from the WHDC web site.
And look for a new review draft of the Windows Vista Logo Program requirements for hardware in the coming week.
So, if you haven't been under a rock, you know that we're very excited about sharing this important milestone for Windows Vista. Join the 10,000+ beta testers in the Windows Vista Technical Beta Program, and take this opportunity to test the Windows Vista infrastructure and the WDK. And then please: provide feedback to Microsoft, following the procedures described in the Beta 1 documentation.
If you aren't part of the Windows Vista Technical Beta Program, you can receive the Windows Vista Beta as an MSDN Subscriber.
—Annie Pearson for the WHDC team
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WHDC After Dark:
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Where the Heck Am I? An MVP (Microsoft Most Valuable Professional) created a .NET application that listens to a Global Positioning System (GPS) device on a serial port. You can read more from this "Some Assembly Required" author at Computer Zen.
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News for Kernel-Mode Developers
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Every Windows driver must handle I/O requests, even if all the driver does is forward them to another driver. A new paper on the WHDC Web site describes how I/O requests are processed within Windows and the Windows Driver Foundation (WDF) kernel-mode driver framework (KMDF).
For KMDF drivers, the framework manages the mechanics of dispatching, queuing, and canceling I/O requests on behalf of its drivers, and notifies the driver by event callbacks of significant events such as requests the driver must handle. KMDF drivers coexist in a device stack along with WDM drivers.
This new paper describes the overall path of an I/O request from the initial request by an application through completion of the request by a driver, focusing on the general activities performed by each component that handles the request. It also describes in detail how a typical KMDF driver processes an I/O request, focusing on the path of the request through different routines in the driver according to the options and configurations the driver chooses.
WDF is the new Microsoft platform for writing Windows drivers. WDF defines a single driver model that is supported by two frameworks: a user-mode driver framework (UMDF) and a kernel-mode driver framework (KMDF). WDF also includes driver verification and testing tools, including Static Driver Verifier (SDV) and PREfast.
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Kits, Tools, Services, Programs, Previews
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Remote NDIS Specification, Revision 1.1 is included as part of the Remote NDIS USB Driver Kit. This kit supplements the Windows Driver Development Kit (DDK) for Remote NDIS (RNDIS) USB drivers. The INF template for Windows 2000 and Windows XP has been updated in this kit.
RNDIS USB drivers are available for redistribution for Windows 2000. Windows XP and Windows CE .NET operating systems include built-in support for RNDIS USB drivers.
This edition of the SDK replaces the previous Software Development Kit (SDK) for Windows XP SP2 and Windows Server 2003 and can be used to develop applications for those platforms. A new custom install allows you to select components you wish to install on a more granular level.
If you build one system a month or more than 100, Microsoft offers software—acquired from Microsoft Authorized Distributors-specifically for you to preinstall on the systems you build.
This conference is your first opportunity in Japan to hear from the creators of Certified Wireless USB (WUSB) following the release of the 1.0 specification and obtain key learnings on how to incorporate Certified Wireless USB into your product roadmaps. The conference will provide detailed information about the WUSB specification from the USB-IF and valuable knowledge for product implementations.
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Edition for
