Windows Programming/Obtaining the DDK

What is the DDK?
Microsoft offers a free Driver Development Kit, for people who are interested in writing device drivers, system services, and other kernel-mode code. The DDK comes with a number of different libraries, extensive documentation, link libraries, a special compiler and linker, and many examples for new driver programmers.

This book discusses the DDK in depth in throughout Section 4, but specifically in the chapter about the DDK.

Obtaining the DDK
The DDK is available free from microsoft, but not as a download. To obtain the DDK, you must order the software on CD, and this comes with a small shipping and handling fee. The DDK has a number of different options, and installing the DDK with every option will require a large amount of disk space.

The DDK used to be available as a download, but to conserve bandwidth, Microsoft has changed their policy to only offer the DDK as a CD. The SDK, and a number of other CDs are also available to order from Microsoft for free (plus shipping and handling), so this might be worthwhile to check out as well.

Order the DDK