HOWTO: Programmatically Install a Display Driver

ID: Q232539

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Windows NT 4.0

SUMMARY

This article explains how to programmatically install a Windows NT 4.0 Display Driver after installation of the operating system has been completed.

MORE INFORMATION

To install a new Display Driver, the Display control panel applet Desk.cpl exports the function InstallGraphicsDriver().

This function is defined as:


DWORD
InstallGraphicsDriver(
   HWND    hwnd, /* Optional */ 
   LPCWSTR pszSourceDirectory,
   LPCWSTR pszModel,
   LPCWSTR pszInf
   )

Parameters


hwnd

Handle to the Parent Window (Optional).


pszSourceDirectory

NULL-terminated Unicode string that contains the Directory where the display driver can be found.


pszModel

NULL-terminated Unicode string that contains the device description found in the associated .inf file.


pszInf

NULL-terminated Unicode string that contains the .inf file for the Display Driver.

A program written to use this function might look like the following sample:

Graphics.c


#include <windows.h>

int wmain( int argc, wchar_t *argv[ ], wchar_t *envp[ ] )
{
    HINSTANCE hLib;
    if (hLib = LoadLibrary("desk.cpl"))
    {
       FARPROC InstGraphDrv;
       if (InstGraphDrv = GetProcAddress(hLib,"InstallGraphicsDriver"))
           (InstGraphDrv)(NULL,argv[1],argv[2],argv[3]);

       FreeLibrary(hLib);
    }
}

To install the 3D RAGE PRO TURBO driver using a driver and an *.inf file in the directory C:\ati\, the command might look like the following:


Graphics.exe c:\ati\ "3D RAGE PRO TURBO" ati.inf

Additional query words:


Keywords          : kbdisplay kbsetup kbGrpNTDDK 
Version           : winnt:4.0
Platform          : winnt 
Issue type        : kbhowto

Last Reviewed: May 26, 1999