Kernel mode DLL Startup

Dear List,
I read a nice article(http://www.wd-3.com/archive/KernelDlls.htm) which
gives solution to many of my problems. As described in this article I
will be exporting some functions and calling them from my other driver.
But I have some installation related queries.
* During installation, I want to start an application which will load
the kernel-dll before the actual driver. (will RunOnce key in .inf
guarantee this) or is there any other way i can do this.

--
Regards

Tim
Thu Jan 13 00:40:50 CST 2005

Naikuteee <Naikuteee@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
>Dear List,
>I read a nice article(http://www.wd-3.com/archive/KernelDlls.htm) which
>gives solution to many of my problems.

Thanks for the kind words.

>As described in this article I
>will be exporting some functions and calling them from my other driver.
>But I have some installation related queries.
>* During installation, I want to start an application which will load
>the kernel-dll before the actual driver. (will RunOnce key in .inf
>guarantee this) or is there any other way i can do this.

Assuming you have your CurrentControlSet\Services registry key set up
correctly, the operating system will load your kernel DLL for you
automatically when your driver loads. You don't have to load it first.

Remember that RunOnce -- like all user-mode solutions -- is usually too
late for drivers loaded at system start. RunOnce doesn't run until you log
in.
--
- Tim Roberts, timr@probo.com
Providenza & Boekelheide, Inc

Naikuteee
Thu Jan 13 02:57:56 CST 2005

Tim Roberts wrote:
> Assuming you have your CurrentControlSet\Services registry key set up
> correctly, the operating system will load your kernel DLL for you
> automatically when your driver loads. You don't have to load it first.

Thank you Tim. I will use this kernel DLL also as a driver and this
should register an interface so that the user-mode app can communicate.
But the kernel-dll is loaded without calling the DriverEntry, so i am
not able to register the interface.

Alternately, I set LowerFilters="Kernel_dll" under
"HKLM\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Enum\USB\Vid_xx&Pid_yy\xyz"
so my kerenel-dll is loaded and the DriverEntry is called without
problem. I am *not* using this kernel-dll as a filter driver. This
method seems to solve the dependency problem. but my concern is that
will it affect the normal functioning of my original driver in any way.
(I am not attaching the kernel-dll to the device stack, and until now it
doesn't seem to cause any problem) Also is there any WHQL specification
of what a filter driver should/should't do.

Thanks for the kind support,

--
Regards,
Naikuteee