Historical Note

Tim_Roberts

As I was reading through my new issue of the NT Insider today, an
interesting historical note struck me.

Peter commented that "I think we all agree that WDF has taken hold". 
Consider this.  WDF has now been in existence longer than WDM had been
when WDF came out.  In fact, WDF is now older than Windows NT was at the
time WDF was released.

Many still think of it as the new kid on the block, but in software
terms, at age 15, WDF is practically creaky.  It is very mature
technology.  When WDF was released, the Linux kernel had just had the
first release of version 2.6.   Since then, 3.x has come and gone, 4.x
is considered mature, and 5.x is in development.  Since then, the C++
has evolved through three very significant upgrades.  The iPhone did not
exist when WDF was released, and they're now on iOS version 12.

It's amazing that we still have to push people to WDF.

Peter_Viscarola_(OSR)

That is a **super **interesting historical note. I didn't believe it when I read it, I said to myself "Oh, SURELY Mr. Roberts is mistaken!"... and thus had to do the math myself... but you're absolutely correct.

Too funny,

Peter

anton_bassov

Many still think of it as the new kid on the block,

I dunno, but the last time I checked WDK samples (I think it was around a year ago or so), I noticed that all "classical" WDM samples like toaster, layered NDIS miniport,various filters et al were gone - only WDF version of these samples was available. Therefore, the above statement seems (at least to me) as a sort of an exaggeration - after all, someone who starts writing drivers these days must be wondering what WDM is even like....

It's amazing that we still have to push people to WDF.

Well, I would say it depends on the project type. As long as we are speaking about a PnP/PM driver, using WDM is simply unreasonable (unless you just happen to be a masochist,of course). However, if you are writing a "legacy" driver that is supposed to get started via SCM, WDM will work just fine in most cases.

OK, I have to shut up now - otherwise 'The Hanging Judge" may get infuriated with my "suggestions", and, taking into consideration that it is Friday the13th today, the consequences of this "unfortunate scenario" may be truly disastrous as far as Mr.Bassov is concerned.....

Anton Bassov

Doron_Holan

Tim, I am feeling both VERY dated :) and proud based on your observation. Working on KMDF as one of the architects for the first few versions and then as the lead when we introduced UMDF2 in Win8, this project has been, by far, one of the biggest highlights of my career at Microsoft.

d