Interrupt Notifications (Windows Embedded CE 6.0)
1/6/2010
An interrupt notification is a signal from an interrupt service thread (IST) that notifies the operating system (OS) that an event must be processed. For devices that connect to a hardware platform through intermediate hardware, the device driver for that intermediate hardware should pass the interrupt notification to the top-level device driver. Generally, the intermediate hardware's device driver has some facility that allows another device driver to register a callback function, which the intermediate device driver calls when an interrupt occurs.
For example, PC Cards connect to hardware platforms through a PC Card slot, which is an intermediate piece of hardware with its own device driver. When a PC Card device sends an interrupt, it is actually the PC Card slot hardware that signals the physical interrupt on the system bus. The device driver for the PC Card slot has an interrupt service routine (ISR) and IST that handle the physical interrupt. They use the CardRequestIRQ function to pass the interrupt to the device driver for the PC Card device. Devices with similar connection methods behave similarly.
See Also
Concepts
Other Resources
Defining an Interrupt Identifier
Implementing an ISR
Loader
PCI Bus Driver
Real-Time Priority System