Has anyone had their WDF-based driver package called "large"?

NTDEV
1

Just out of curiosity, has anyone here had their WDF-based driver package called “large” by a customer?

I was ready to just ignore this, but I’ve now had two different customers now complain (or maybe just “remark”) that our driver package is on the “large” side.

Our driver package .MSI is only about two megs, and contains the WDF coinstaller (~1.3MB), the DIFX DLL and our installer exe (~400K), and then five kernel drivers w/ catalog files (~300K).

Obviously the coinstaller contributes most of the size, but I mean, is two megs a lot? No, right?

2

xxxxx@gmail.com schrieb:

Just out of curiosity, has anyone here had their WDF-based driver package called “large” by a customer?

I was ready to just ignore this, but I’ve now had two different customers now complain
(or maybe just “remark”) that our driver package is on the “large” side.

Our driver package .MSI is only about two megs, and contains the WDF coinstaller (~1.3MB),
the DIFX DLL and our installer exe (~400K), and then five kernel drivers w/ catalog files (~300K).

Obviously the coinstaller contributes most of the size, but I mean, is two megs a lot? No, right?

Well, that depends on how you bring the driver to the machine and to to
what people are used to.

Example 1:
When testing my WDM USB driver, I also had to test it on Windows 98 SE
and Windows ME. As I didn’t have a Win98SE image available, I had to set
up a Win98SE box.

I wanted to install some of the PC drivers using my FlashMemory USB
Stick. OK. Hm - for Win98 you have to use a special MSD driver!

On the manufacturer website I found two drivers. One was in an 800kB
archive. OK, copy it on a floppy disk and install. But it did not work.

The other one came in a 3.4MB install file - and it is highly annoying
if you have to split a monolithic 3.4MB driver installer EXE into four
parts and copy it over to the box (using three or four disks) only to
the get ~50kB of MSD driver files installed in the end.
(And I was lucky I didn’t have to use the 6.5MB install package!)

So if it does not fit on a single disk, for me it is “large”.

Example 2: A Win95/NT driver for an external parallel CD-ROM driver I
had to use three years ago came on three disks. And it was broken, it
would not install properly on NT. So I unpacked the install archives
only to find that the driver consisted of two 5k INF files and two 19k
and 25k SYS files.
More than 2 disks were only for the installer itself. Ugh!

Example 3:
Our complete WDM USB driver installation directory - for all platforms
Win98SE, WinME, Win2000, WinXP, WinXP64, Win2003Server, NET64, Vista32
and Vista 64 - amounts to 150kB (uncompressed).

The WUDF version - only for XP and Vista - amounts to 2.73MB,
of which 2.70MB are for WdfCoInstaller01005, WinUSBCoInstaller and
WUDFUpdate_01005.

Conclusion:
So, yes, 2 MB may be perceived as “large”. And rightly so.
That will probably change in the next years, though… :slight_smile:

BTW, guess, whether I will ever roll out the WUDF driver version?
Not as long as I have a choice or until I can do without the 2.70MB
co-installer files.

Comments?
-H

3

Hagen Patzke wrote:

The other one came in a 3.4MB install file - and it is
highly annoying if you have to split a monolithic 3.4MB
driver installer EXE into four parts and copy it over to
the box (using three or four disks) only to the get
~50kB of MSD driver files installed in the end. (And I
was lucky I didn’t have to use the 6.5MB install package!)

So if it does not fit on a single disk, for me it is “large”.

Well, in this case, it sounds like the installer also contained a bunch of other cruft that you didn’t need, which isn’t the case with our package. It’s not like downloading printer drivers where sometimes it won’t even fit on a CD, let alone a floppy disk.

Our package either comes as part of a CD with a ton of other stuff on it, or just downloaded from a website. In either case, I don’t understand the complaint…

The WUDF version - only for XP and Vista - amounts to
2.73MB, of which 2.70MB are for WdfCoInstaller01005,
WinUSBCoInstaller and WUDFUpdate_01005.

Well, yeah. I wonder if there is a way to estimate how big our drivers would be if they statically linked against KMDF instead of using the coinstaller. Not that it matters, I suppose :slight_smile:

4

xxxxx@gmail.com wrote:

Our package either comes as part of a CD with a ton of other stuff on it,
or just downloaded from a website.
In either case, I don’t understand the complaint…

Now I do understand it - if you have to download the stuff, and you are
not in the lucky position of having hi-speed access but have to use e.g.
a donwload via a mobile phone or a modem somehwere in a hotel room,
then 2MB are large. I’ve had to do it. Customer network highly secured
with no useable internet connection. Download device driver in hotel
room without LAN access but phone/modem access. Not nice.

Well, yeah. I wonder if there is a way to estimate how big our drivers would be
if they statically linked against KMDF instead of using the coinstaller.
Not that it matters, I suppose :slight_smile:

Well, it would be definitely undesirable to have a static linkage in
case someone wants to use the driver on a newer version of the OS with a
bug-fixed or enhanced version of the KMDF in place.

The main hassle is that you have to deploy all the co-installers and
updates for the older OSs with your driver.

It’s a standard problem you always have if using something that was not
“in the original box” when the OS was shipped.

5

Another thing to realize is that some firms make their driver packages huge
without KMDF. For instance, I bought a new test machine recently and since
I did not want an OS installed I specified the Linux version. I then
loaded up Server 2003 x64 and found I needed the network driver. Going to
the computer manufacturer I found a 2.5MB file to download that had all
sorts of wrappers around it, and in the end complained that the system was
a desktop, and I was running 2003 so they could not load the driver! I
went to the nic vendor, and downloaded a file < 100KB that was the driver
and installed fine. Later testing showed the 2.5MB package contained
exactly the same driver!

–
Don Burn (MVP, Windows DDK)
Windows 2k/XP/2k3 Filesystem and Driver Consulting
Website: http://www.windrvr.com
Blog: http://msmvps.com/blogs/WinDrvr
Remove StopSpam to reply

“Hagen Patzke” wrote in message news:xxxxx@ntdev…
> xxxxx@gmail.com wrote:
>> Our package either comes as part of a CD with a ton of other stuff on
>> it, or just downloaded from a website. In either case, I don’t
>> understand the complaint…
>
> Now I do understand it - if you have to download the stuff, and you are
> not in the lucky position of having hi-speed access but have to use e.g.
> a donwload via a mobile phone or a modem somehwere in a hotel room,
> then 2MB are large. I’ve had to do it. Customer network highly secured
> with no useable internet connection. Download device driver in hotel room
> without LAN access but phone/modem access. Not nice.
>
>> Well, yeah. I wonder if there is a way to estimate how big our drivers
>> would be if they statically linked against KMDF instead of using the
>> coinstaller. Not that it matters, I suppose :slight_smile:
>
> Well, it would be definitely undesirable to have a static linkage in case
> someone wants to use the driver on a newer version of the OS with a
> bug-fixed or enhanced version of the KMDF in place.
>
> The main hassle is that you have to deploy all the co-installers and
> updates for the older OSs with your driver.
>
> It’s a standard problem you always have if using something that was not
> “in the original box” when the OS was shipped.
>

6

Try installing an HP printer ;). I think the final download was 100MB.

d

-----Original Message-----
From: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
[mailto:xxxxx@lists.osr.com] On Behalf Of Don Burn
Sent: Thursday, March 15, 2007 9:50 AM
To: Windows System Software Devs Interest List
Subject: Re:[ntdev] Has anyone had their WDF-based driver package called
“large”?

Another thing to realize is that some firms make their driver packages
huge
without KMDF. For instance, I bought a new test machine recently and
since
I did not want an OS installed I specified the Linux version. I then
loaded up Server 2003 x64 and found I needed the network driver. Going
to
the computer manufacturer I found a 2.5MB file to download that had all
sorts of wrappers around it, and in the end complained that the system
was
a desktop, and I was running 2003 so they could not load the driver! I

went to the nic vendor, and downloaded a file < 100KB that was the
driver
and installed fine. Later testing showed the 2.5MB package contained
exactly the same driver!

–
Don Burn (MVP, Windows DDK)
Windows 2k/XP/2k3 Filesystem and Driver Consulting
Website: http://www.windrvr.com
Blog: http://msmvps.com/blogs/WinDrvr
Remove StopSpam to reply

“Hagen Patzke” wrote in message
news:xxxxx@ntdev…
> xxxxx@gmail.com wrote:
>> Our package either comes as part of a CD with a ton of other stuff on

>> it, or just downloaded from a website. In either case, I don’t
>> understand the complaint…
>
> Now I do understand it - if you have to download the stuff, and you
are
> not in the lucky position of having hi-speed access but have to use
e.g.
> a donwload via a mobile phone or a modem somehwere in a hotel room,
> then 2MB are large. I’ve had to do it. Customer network highly
secured
> with no useable internet connection. Download device driver in hotel
room
> without LAN access but phone/modem access. Not nice.
>
>> Well, yeah. I wonder if there is a way to estimate how big our
drivers
>> would be if they statically linked against KMDF instead of using the
>> coinstaller. Not that it matters, I suppose :slight_smile:
>
> Well, it would be definitely undesirable to have a static linkage in
case
> someone wants to use the driver on a newer version of the OS with a
> bug-fixed or enhanced version of the KMDF in place.
>
> The main hassle is that you have to deploy all the co-installers and
> updates for the older OSs with your driver.
>
> It’s a standard problem you always have if using something that was
not
> “in the original box” when the OS was shipped.
>

—
Questions? First check the Kernel Driver FAQ at
http://www.osronline.com/article.cfm?id=256

To unsubscribe, visit the List Server section of OSR Online at
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7

I’ll go a bit out on a limb here (this may be impinging on undisclosable topics, or I could just be paranoid), but AFAIK, much of the reason for those sizes are somewhat out of our control. Even though the KMDF coinstaller is going to install (or not install, per the versioning mechanism) exactly the same files in exactly the same way on each OS, we are required to do the installation utilizing a mechanism requiring a separate update package for each OS we support- and the package executables themselves are a part of that added overhead, as well.

I expect (but am not certain) that similar conditions exist for the other binaries mentioned.

8

BTW, a driver linked to the static version of KMDF (if it were available) would start out at around 570K before writing a single line of code.

d

9

Doron Holan wrote:

Try installing an HP printer ;). I think the final download was 100MB.

I have a whole comedy routine about HP printer “drivers”. All I want is
a piece of plumbing from GDI to the laser. HP, on the other hand,
thinks I want 32 DLLs, 15 EXEs, 8 full-time services, 5 tray icons, 7
continuously running processes, keyboard and mouse filters, toolbars,
crippled imaging applications, and who knows what else. Like many
vendors, they believe the sole function of my computer is to drive their
device.

PLEASE stop “adding value”. Just put bits on paper. That’s all I
want. I no longer recommend HP to my clients because of the stupidity
of their monolithic printer driver packages. Epson is only a little better.

–
Tim Roberts, xxxxx@probo.com
Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.

10

Odd. I thought the whole point of your machine was to make the company
money by taking it from other companies who want to add their crap to
your desktop as well. At least that explains why AOL would sometimes
come free with devices that had little or nothing to do with networking.

-p

-----Original Message-----
From: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
[mailto:xxxxx@lists.osr.com] On Behalf Of Tim Roberts
Sent: Thursday, March 15, 2007 11:04 AM
To: Windows System Software Devs Interest List
Subject: Re: [ntdev] Has anyone had their WDF-based driver package
called “large”?

Doron Holan wrote:

Try installing an HP printer ;). I think the final download was
100MB.

I have a whole comedy routine about HP printer “drivers”. All I want is
a piece of plumbing from GDI to the laser. HP, on the other hand,
thinks I want 32 DLLs, 15 EXEs, 8 full-time services, 5 tray icons, 7
continuously running processes, keyboard and mouse filters, toolbars,
crippled imaging applications, and who knows what else. Like many
vendors, they believe the sole function of my computer is to drive their
device.

PLEASE stop “adding value”. Just put bits on paper. That’s all I
want. I no longer recommend HP to my clients because of the stupidity
of their monolithic printer driver packages. Epson is only a little
better.

–
Tim Roberts, xxxxx@probo.com
Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc.

Questions? First check the Kernel Driver FAQ at
http://www.osronline.com/article.cfm?id=256

To unsubscribe, visit the List Server section of OSR Online at
http://www.osronline.com/page.cfm?name=ListServer

11

Tim Roberts wrote:

All I want is a piece of plumbing from GDI to the laser…
PLEASE stop “adding value”. Just put bits on paper.

Amen Tim, Amen. You can apply this to about any kind of driver these days. The sloppy ATI video drivers that litter icons and garbage everywhere come to mind and to make matters worse they need updated frequently. I think what happens is people get so wrapped up in their little technology they forget all the rest of the world wants is just to use their PC in peace, quiet, and simplicity. Get out of the tray, no balloons, no litter in the menus, no periodic/critical updates, etc.

Back on topic, yes the package is large but not unusual. Scary to think not many years ago the same package would be about 100x smaller. Even scarier to think tiny driver packages may be a gigabyte in the not so far off future and no one will care save an obscure thread like this.

I am also not happy Microsoft’s direction is to force people to have one package for 32-bit and another for 64-bit. A package should auto sense and just do the right thing and the size difference could be a small fraction. But no, it’s like we are right back in the days of games prompting “choose your video card: 1) CGA, 2) EGA, 3) EGA” instead of auto sensing and doing the right thing because most users don’t have a clue about such things.

eof