Vista driver verifier enhancements
I just ran across this document that explains the changes present in Vista’s driver verifier. Verifier is one of the Best Things Ever.
Thanks to Dan Mihai from Microsoft for pointing this out on the newsgroups.
Keeping ExInterlocked* operations interlocked
To continue on yesterday’s discussion of interlocked lists, let’s explore the nature of the interlocking done by the ExInterlocked* APIs. The ExInterlockedRemoveHeadList documentation says the following about its spin lock argument:
You must use this spin lock only with the ExInterlockedXxxList routines.
The documentation page provides a hint as to why this is the case:
The ExInterlockedRemoveHeadList routine […]
Get ready for more random crash bugs
For better or worse, Ars is reporting that Gateway will start selling factory-overclocked computers. They’re only overclocking the highest-end systems, and (surprisingly) they seem to be offering a full factory warranty.
Someone asked on one of the newsgroups the other day why overclocking matters. When you run a CPU out of spec, it can fail in […]
Why is there no ExInterlockedRemoveEntryList?
A long time ago, I promised an entry on why there is no ExInterlockedRemoveEntryList function. If you search the NTDEV archives (or if you got to hear Peter Viscarola from OSR discuss it at one of the Driver DevCons a while back), you know that Microsoft left the function out intentionally due to its potential […]
Downlevel support for Winsock Kernel
David Powell from the provided me with some insight about the possibility of downlevel support for WSK, now that TDI is being deprecated. He tells me that the WSK team has been getting lots of requests for Windows XP/2003 support lately, and that it’s high on our list of things to do as soon as […]
Back to the salt mines
After a great week at Microsoft’s Redmond campus, it’s back to the Real World™ to do some actual work. Everyone at Microsoft was really helpful, and I owe thanks to lots of people for their help in making our trip as successful as it was.
First off, the compatibility lab was great. The team that runs […]
Saturday night culture blogging
It’s been a long time since I’ve written anything (this) irrelevant :-), and since today is Daylight Savings day in the US, I thought I’d use the extra hour to no good end.
I have probably over-blogged my addiction to Beethoven at this point, but my wife just pointed out this trailer for a movie entitled […]
Microsoft differentiates Visual C++Standard from Express
I’ve blogged a few times about how good of a value I think Visual C++ Express Edition is. Just last week, I was telling someone that there just aren’t that many compelling differences between Express and Standard (or really even Professional, for my taste), until you get to the Team System stuff (about which I […]
TechCrunch on CarsDirect
Mike Arrington confirms something I’ve always suspected: CarsDirect is a pretty good way to buy a new car. I’ve never gotten to use them because they haven’t had dealers in my area for the car I’ve wanted.
Joe Duffy on concurrency
Joe Duffy, a PM on the CLR team, has a great article up about concurrency and reusable libraries. He’s been posting concurrency- and scalability-related articles for a while now. The article (and his blog in general) are worth checking out if you’re interested in that sort of thing.
In particular, he opens up with predictions of […]