Operating system | Development status Active | |
Stable release 10.1 / November 1, 2015; 16 months ago (2015-11-01) Website developer.microsoft.com/windows/hardware/windows-driver-kit | ||
The Windows Driver Kit (WDK) is a software toolset from Microsoft that enables the development of device drivers for the Microsoft Windows platform. It includes documentation, samples, build environments, and tools for driver developers.
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History of WDK
Previously, the WDK was known as Windows Driver Development Kit (DDK) and supported Windows Driver Model (WDM) development. It got its current name when Microsoft released Windows Vista and added the following tools to the kit:
DDK Versions
Note: Windows NT DDK, Windows 98 DDK and Windows 2000 DDK are no longer available for download by Microsoft because of Java-related settlements made by Microsoft with Sun Microsystems.
The DDK for Windows 2000 and earlier versions did not include a compiler; instead Visual C++ was used to compile drivers. From the version for Windows XP the DDK and later the WDK include a command line compiler that is used to compile drivers. One of the reasons Microsoft gave for including a compiler was that the quality of drivers would improve if they were compiled with the same version of the compiler that was used to compile Windows itself while Visual C++ is targeted to application development and has a different product cycle with more frequent changes.
WDK Versions
Later DTM was renamed to Windows Logo Kit (WLK) and separated from WDK.
As in the later DDKs, a compiler is included in the WDK until and including WDK 7.1.0, while the WDK 8.x and later series goes back to using Visual Studio as the compiler.