DriverStudio Programmable Interface

NTDEV
1

A hypothetical question…

Were we to add a driver-accessible programming API to DriverStudio/SoftICE,
what would you guys like to see in it ? Would that be an improvement to the
way you write your drivers today ?

Inquiring minds want to know. :slight_smile:

Alberto.

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2

Full access to internal critical Softice varibales and tables through
methods, and at least the level Windbg programable interface allows.
Also, access to Sice command line and parsing functions for easy handling.

In rest , you know what I want to see inside =) .

Ciao, Dan

----- Original Message -----
From: “Moreira, Alberto”
To: “NT Developers Interest List”
Sent: Tuesday, December 03, 2002 5:56 PM
Subject: [ntdev] DriverStudio Programmable Interface

>
> A hypothetical question…
>
> Were we to add a driver-accessible programming API to
DriverStudio/SoftICE,
> what would you guys like to see in it ? Would that be an improvement to
the
> way you write your drivers today ?
>
> Inquiring minds want to know. :slight_smile:
>
>
> Alberto.
>
>
>
> The contents of this e-mail are intended for the named addressee only. It
> contains information that may be confidential. Unless you are the named
> addressee or an authorized designee, you may not copy or use it, or
disclose
> it to anyone else. If you received it in error please notify us
immediately
> and then destroy it.
>
>
>
> —
> You are currently subscribed to ntdev as: xxxxx@rdsor.ro
> To unsubscribe send a blank email to %%email.unsub%%
>

3

In principle I agree with Dan. It would be enough for the first iteration
:wink:

The next thing are callbacks. It would be useful to be called at some
moments, for example when SI displays debug output, when breakpoint is
raised (extended action) allow to tell if bp should be raised (extended
condition), when execution is stopped and resumed etc. If you have ever seen
SeeCode debugger (for embedded apps), something like its Semantic Inspection
interface notification method.

Also it would be useful to be able to influence some GUI actions. For
example if I have a String class implemented as reference counted object,
display string contents instead of object internals. MSVC debugger allows
something like this (don’t know exactly how because don’t use it; coworker
showed me it once). The same with templates and arrays (SI arrays handing is
rather painful).

Hopefully it isn’t only hypothetical and won’t last next ten years to
implement :wink:

Michal

Best regards,

Michal Vodicka
STMicroelectronics Design and Application s.r.o.
[michal.vodicka@st.com, http:://www.st.com]

From: xxxxx@rdsor.ro[SMTP:xxxxx@rdsor.ro]
Reply To: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
Sent: Tuesday, December 03, 2002 5:04 PM
To: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
Subject: [ntdev] Re: DriverStudio Programmable Interface

Full access to internal critical Softice varibales and tables through
methods, and at least the level Windbg programable interface allows.
Also, access to Sice command line and parsing functions for easy handling.

In rest , you know what I want to see inside =) .

Ciao, Dan

----- Original Message -----
From: “Moreira, Alberto”
> To: “NT Developers Interest List”
> Sent: Tuesday, December 03, 2002 5:56 PM
> Subject: [ntdev] DriverStudio Programmable Interface
>
>
> >
> > A hypothetical question…
> >
> > Were we to add a driver-accessible programming API to
> DriverStudio/SoftICE,
> > what would you guys like to see in it ? Would that be an improvement to
> the
> > way you write your drivers today ?
> >
> > Inquiring minds want to know. :slight_smile:
> >
> >
> > Alberto.
> >
> >
> >
> > The contents of this e-mail are intended for the named addressee only.
> It
> > contains information that may be confidential. Unless you are the named
> > addressee or an authorized designee, you may not copy or use it, or
> disclose
> > it to anyone else. If you received it in error please notify us
> immediately
> > and then destroy it.
> >
> >
> >
> > —
> > You are currently subscribed to ntdev as: xxxxx@rdsor.ro
> > To unsubscribe send a blank email to %%email.unsub%%
> >
>
>
>
> —
> You are currently subscribed to ntdev as: michal.vodicka@st.com
> To unsubscribe send a blank email to %%email.unsub%%
>

4

(I just can’t resist…)

Before you do a programmable interface, or anything else value-added, could
you please make SoftIce support DbgPrompt(…) correctly? Please???

Peter
OSR

5

Ok Padre Pedro, just WHAT is DbgPrompt? I find no mention of it in the
2600.1106 DDK. I find two, thats right boys and girls TWO, mentions of it in
the latest release of WinDbg, one in .fnent and one in .ofilter. There is,
however, no prototype or discussion of what DbgPrompt do or don’t do.

:slight_smile:

–
Gary G. Little
Have Computer, will travel …
909-698-3191
909-551-2105

Why? I find no mention of DbgPrompt in the DDK
“Peter Viscarola” wrote in message news:xxxxx@ntdev…
>
> (I just can’t resist…)
>
> Before you do a programmable interface, or anything else value-added,
could
> you please make SoftIce support DbgPrompt(…) correctly? Please???
>
> Peter
> OSR
>
>
>
>
>

6

How about the ability to cause SoftIce to ‘call’ functions in my driver?
For example, I would declare a diagnostic function foobar() in a certain
way, and export the function, then I could invoke ‘foobar’ from SoftIce
manually.

P.S. Alberto, PLEASE try to convince the SoftIce team to introduce point
updates more often. There still isn’t a point update yet that supports
XP SP1 - 2.7 works, but many features are crippled because of
evolutionary changes in ntoskrnl that cause API hook failures. I just
called tech support, and they have some sort of unofficial fix they can
send to me, but this really isn’t acceptable.

  • Nicholas Ryan

-----Original Message-----
From: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
[mailto:xxxxx@lists.osr.com] On Behalf Of Moreira, Alberto
Sent: Tuesday, December 03, 2002 7:56 AM
To: NT Developers Interest List
Subject: [ntdev] DriverStudio Programmable Interface

A hypothetical question…

Were we to add a driver-accessible programming API to
DriverStudio/SoftICE, what would you guys like to see in it ?
Would that be an improvement to the way you write your
drivers today ?

Inquiring minds want to know. :slight_smile:

Alberto.

The contents of this e-mail are intended for the named
addressee only. It contains information that may be
confidential. Unless you are the named addressee or an
authorized designee, you may not copy or use it, or disclose
it to anyone else. If you received it in error please notify
us immediately and then destroy it.

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7

Gary Little wrote:

Ok Padre Pedro, just WHAT is DbgPrompt? I find no mention of it in the
2600.1106 DDK. I find two, thats right boys and girls TWO, mentions of it in
the latest release of WinDbg, one in .fnent and one in .ofilter. There is,
however, no prototype or discussion of what DbgPrompt do or don’t do.

It has always frustrated me that it is not documented since it is a highly
useful debugging aid. Gary the function is as

DbgPrompt (PCHAR Prompt,PCHAR Buffer,ULONG Size)

Parameters

Prompt Specifies a null-terminated string to print as the prompt
Buffer Receives the character string input from the debugger
Size Specifies the length of the Buffer in bytes.

This is so useful for writing customized assert type code of the form
OOP’s I
got here and what should I do now?

Don Burn
Egenera, Inc

8

> ----------

From: xxxxx@acm.org[SMTP:xxxxx@acm.org]
Reply To: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
Sent: Thursday, December 05, 2002 2:07 PM
To: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
Subject: [ntdev] Re: DriverStudio Programmable Interface

It has always frustrated me that it is not documented since it is a highly
useful debugging aid. Gary the function is as

DbgPrompt (PCHAR Prompt,PCHAR Buffer,ULONG Size)

Parameters

Prompt Specifies a null-terminated string to print as the prompt
Buffer Receives the character string input from the debugger
Size Specifies the length of the Buffer in bytes.

This is so useful for writing customized assert type code of the form
OOP’s I
got here and what should I do now?

Don, thanks for explanation, it seems really useful. So I agree with Peter
and vote for correct SoftICE support. Alberto?

Best regards,

Michal Vodicka
STMicroelectronics Design and Application s.r.o.
[michal.vodicka@st.com, http:://www.st.com]

9

We weren’t aware of this issue. We’ll take a look, and if it is simple
enough we’ll put it in the next release. Coming soon to a theater near you !
Watch this space.

Alberto.

-----Original Message-----
From: Michal Vodicka [mailto:xxxxx@veridicom.cz.nospam]
Sent: Thursday, December 05, 2002 3:23 PM
To: NT Developers Interest List
Subject: [ntdev] Re: DriverStudio Programmable Interface

From: xxxxx@acm.org[SMTP:xxxxx@acm.org]
Reply To: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
Sent: Thursday, December 05, 2002 2:07 PM
To: xxxxx@lists.osr.com
Subject: [ntdev] Re: DriverStudio Programmable Interface

It has always frustrated me that it is not documented since it is a highly
useful debugging aid. Gary the function is as

DbgPrompt (PCHAR Prompt,PCHAR Buffer,ULONG Size)

Parameters

Prompt Specifies a null-terminated string to print as the prompt
Buffer Receives the character string input from the debugger
Size Specifies the length of the Buffer in bytes.

This is so useful for writing customized assert type code of the form
OOP’s I
got here and what should I do now?

Don, thanks for explanation, it seems really useful. So I agree with Peter
and vote for correct SoftICE support. Alberto?

Best regards,

Michal Vodicka
STMicroelectronics Design and Application s.r.o.
[michal.vodicka@st.com, http:://www.st.com]

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