Roadmap for Developing Biometric Drivers

This article provides a roadmap for developing biometric drivers. The roadmap includes steps that you should follow to develop a biometric driver.

Step 1: Learn about Windows architecture and drivers

You should understand the fundamentals of how drivers work in Windows operating systems. Knowing the fundamentals will help you make appropriate design decisions and let you streamline your development process. For more information about driver fundamentals, see Understanding Driver and Operating System Basics.

Step 2: Learn how Windows supports biometric drivers

The Windows Biometric Driver Interface (WBDI) is an IOCTL-based driver interface that is part of the Windows Biometric Framework (WBF). To learn more about WBDI, see Getting Started with Biometric Drivers.

Step 3: Review the biometric driver sample in the WDK

The driver code gallery includes a sample called WudfBioUsbSample. This sample WBDI driver is UMDF-based, and uses the USB I/O Target.

For more information about the WudfBioUsbSample sample, see the sample description.

Step 4: Select a driver model for your biometric driver

Microsoft recommends that WBDI drivers are UMDF-based and use the USB I/O target. For information about UMDF, see Introduction to UMDF. For information about the USB I/O target, see Handling a USB I/O Target.

WudfBioUsbSample demonstrates how to implement a UMDF-based WBDI driver that uses a USB I/O target.

If you use UMDF, Microsoft recommends that you develop your biometric driver in C++.

Step 5: Learn about the Windows driver build, test, and debug processes and tools

Building a driver differs from building a user-mode application. For information see Building a Driver. For information about how to build a framework-based driver, see Building and Loading a Framework-based Driver.

Step 6: Make design decisions about your biometric driver

For information about how to handle IOCTLs, see Supporting Biometric IOCTL Calling Sequence. For information about how to use the USB I/O target in a WBDI driver, see Using WinUSB in a WBDI Driver.

Step 7: Develop, build, test, and debug your biometric driver

For more information about how to manage request queues in a WBDI driver, see Managing Queues in a WBDI Driver.

For more information about IOCTLs, structures, and error codes related to WBDI, see Biometric Devices Reference.

For information about how to test biometric drivers, see Testing Biometric Drivers.

For information about iterative building, testing, and debugging, see Developing, Testing, and Deploying Drivers. This process helps to ensure that you create a driver that works.

Step 8: Create a driver package for your biometric driver

For more information, see Driver Packages.

For information about how to install biometric drivers, see Installing a Biometric Driver.

Step 9: Sign and distribute your biometric driver

The final step is to sign and distribute the driver. You must sign your engine adapter on both 32-bit and 64-bit platforms.

If your driver meets the quality standards that are defined for the Microsoft Hardware Certification Program, you can distribute it through the Microsoft Windows Update program. For more information about how to distribute a driver, see Manage driver distribution with shipping labels.