Path: news.mitre.org!blanket.mitre.org!agate!usenet.INS.CWRU.Edu!news.apk.net!news.micro-net.net!news.icm.edu.pl!news-spur1.maxwell.syr.edu!news.maxwell.syr.edu!news-peer.sprintlink.net!news-sea-19.sprintlink.net!news-in-west.sprintlink.net!news.sprintlink.net!Sprint!209.90.0.8!alpha.sky.net!newshub.cts.com!newsfeed.cts.com!cmkrnl!jeh From: jeh@cmkrnl.com (Jamie Hanrahan) Newsgroups: comp.os.ms-windows.programmer.nt.kernel-mode Subject: Re: Building WDM/NT drivers in DevStudio ... Message-ID: <1997Nov14.184824.8303@cmkrnl> Date: 14 Nov 97 18:48:24 PST References: <64iako$rgr$1@owl.slip.net> Organization: Kernel Mode Systems, San Diego, CA Lines: 57 In article <64iako$rgr$1@owl.slip.net>, "Russ B." writes: > Why are we unable to build WDM drivers/modules (or NT drivers) from > DevStudio??? > > I am trying to build WDM modules for Microsoft Windows 98. Shouldn't I be > able to use Microsoft DevStudio (MS Visual C++ IDE) to build this stuff ??? > > Microsoft has gone to a geat deal of trouble to build an interactive > development environment (editors, browsers, help/info, etc...) and I am > apparently not able to use it to build the latest enhancment to the Windows > architecture. What's up with that ??? It's fairly simple once you understand the history. Our good friend BUILD is the same tool used by MS to build not just drivers but also ntoskrnl.exe, hal.dll, and a lot else that ships with NT. Now NT was developed long before 32-bit VC++ existed. In fact, until there was a VC++ for NT, we got a command-line-based C compiler as part of the SDK. This is what we used to build drivers, just as MS used it to build NT. And MS is still using it to build NT. (Heck, a lot of the kernel team prefers good old i386kd to windbg, let alone SoftICE for NT.) By "NT" I mean about four CD-ROMs worth of source files. I doubt that anyone in MS is going to seriously consider the notion of stopping NT development while they convert 'n'-hundred (maybe 'n'-thousand) .sources files into VC "Project workspaces" and then go back and make sure that the change hasn't caused some subtle corruption of the build results. > Is someone up at Microsoft looking into this, and if not, WHY NOT ??? Because it isn't that big a deal to them? > Does anyone know who, up at Microsoft, I could talk to about getting > DevStudio upgraded to support the building of WDM modules ??? The DDK support team does read this newsgroup and feeds suggestions back to the developers. However I think you can safely assume that this suggestion has been made many times already. In the meantime, if you don't mind building drivers with an unsupported environment, there are lots of hacks around that let you invoke BUILD from inside the IDE -- if it really troubles you that much to have to type BUILD at a command prompt. (I truly wish that that was the least of *my* worries in this field. Sheesh!!!) --- Jamie Hanrahan, Kernel Mode Systems, San Diego CA Internet: jeh@cmkrnl.com (JH645) CompuServe: 74140,2055 drivers, internals, networks, applications, and training for VMS and Windows NT NT driver FAQ, links, and other information: http://www.cmkrnl.com/ If you post a reply in news, please don't e-mail it too.