Introduction to the Windows Driver Foundation

The Microsoft Windows operating system supports thousands of devices. More than 30,000 drivers have been released, and more are introduced daily. Some of these drivers are based on models that were designed more than 10 years ago. Although these models represented the state of the art at the time, today's devices and operating system technologies stretch these outdated designs to their limits.

Microsoft is taking steps to simplify the development of Windows drivers, and to improve driver quality and system reliability. This paper describes the Windows driver models that are currently supported, summarizes their limitations, and introduces the Windows Driver Foundation, which addresses these problems.