DDK Notes - March 1994

by Tony Arcuri

The IBM Device Driver Source Kit for OS/2 (DDK) has come a long way in its first year; from humble beginnings of about 30 drivers and a few tools to over 90 drivers, several test and maintenance tools, and documentation, both online and available in print, to assist in your device driver development. The DDK team is proud of its achievement, having received favorable feedback from you, but we are not yet satisfied. You can count on us to deliver more quality and useful information in the coming year.

The DDK is just one piece in the set of IBM's Personal Operating System software development tools. The tools team is beginning to implement a strategy that will, over time, create a comprehensive and cohesive development suite. Our team 's primary goal is to deliver quality development information on a timely basis to a worldwide audience. We have put the needs of the developers first and will continue to do so with frequent updates and communication.

As part of that, The Developer Connection News will accompany future releases of the DDK CD-ROM. This newsletter will enhance the great deal of technical data on device driver development included with the DDK and will fortify our commitment to communicating with and assisting the development community. Suggestions for future articles are welcome.

As our development products mature, we recognize opportunities for usability improvements to the rapid increase of data contained on our CD-ROMs. As more developers take advantage of the multiple tool offerings, we realize a standard user interface is necessary. We have used the survey results from the San Jose Device Driver Conference and other customer feedback to better address your development needs. The installation, search engine, online assistance, and other product utilities will be enhanced with you in mind. For example, we will place more emphasis on using the CD-ROM. One example of this is the ability to open books directly from the CD-ROM, rather than installing them on your hard drive.

As we implement these enhancements, we will continue to deliver quality releases. We will expand our coverage of driver sources, aggressively seek new tools and test suites, and complement it all with technical documentation and support (be sure to re view the offerings provided by the Driver Development Support Center (DDSC) in this newsletter).

The DDK team strives to meet your expectations, and we encourage your suggestions to help us attain complete customer satisfaction. We value your input and request a small investment of your time so that we can better serve your device driver development efforts. Suggestions can be made through the DUDE (see the directory), the Developer Connection section on CompuServe, or you can write to us at the address listed in this newsletter.