DAUx Windows Driver Development Workspace

Welcome to the DAUx (DirectAudioStream Extension) Windows driver development workspace. This directory contains the source code, tools, documentation, and SDK interface for the DAUx low-latency virtual and physical audio driver stack.

Workspace Directory Structure

• docs/: Documentation files explaining driver safety, architecture, and environment configuration.
  • DAUx-Driver-Architecture.md
  • Build-Environment.md
  • Driver-Safety-Rules.md
  • Sample-References.md
• tools/: Scripts for checking the development environment.
  • detect-vs.ps1
  • detect-wdk.ps1
  • env-report.ps1
  • inspect-samples.ps1
• src/: Driver and user space control source code.
  • daux_virtual/: Skeleton code for the prototype virtual audio driver.
• sdk/: SDK interface declarations.
  • include/: Native C headers (daux.h).
  • rust/: Rust bindings for the DAUx API.

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Current Workspace Status

• Driver Skeleton Code: Created in src/daux_virtual/driver/ with modules for driver entry, device context, endpoints, stream states, cyclic buffers, performance counter clocks, and XRuns.
• Controller Utility: User-mode controller utility skeleton created in src/daux_virtual/user/ (dauxctl).
• Environment Verification: Successfully executed environment check. The host machine is equipped with VS 2025/2026 Community, Windows SDK 10.0.26100.0, and WDK 10.0.28000.0.
• Driver Samples: Microsoft Windows driver samples cloned locally to external/vendor/Windows-driver-samples.

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Detected Environment Summary

• Visual Studio: Version 18.4.11612.150 (C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\18\Community)
• MSBuild: C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio\18\Community\MSBuild\Current\Bin\MSBuild.exe
• VC Tools: Version 14.50.35717
• Windows SDK: 10.0.26100.0
• Windows WDK: 10.0.28000.0
• ACX Audio Framework: Available (headers acx.h version 1.0 and 1.1 located)
• Build Verification Result: PASS (General environment check)
• Dry Compilation Check: PASS_BUILD_WITH_PACKAGE_VERIFICATION_SKIPPED
  • Built using build-sample.ps1 with matching WDKBuildFolder=10.0.28000.0 and verification bypassed.
  • Output Binary: external/vendor/Windows-driver-samples/audio/Acx/Samples/AudioCodec/Driver/x64/Debug/AudioCodec.sys
  • Output Catalog: external/vendor/Windows-driver-samples/audio/Acx/Samples/AudioCodec/Driver/x64/Debug/AudioCodec/audiocodec.cat
  • Warning: Do not install this binary. Package validation (InfVerif) and API compatibility checks (ApiValidator) were skipped.

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Reference Driver Samples

We reference official Microsoft sample code located in our repository vendor path:

• ACX Audio Sample: external/vendor/Windows-driver-samples/audio/Acx/Samples/AudioCodec/Driver/AudioCodec.sln
• SYSVAD (WaveRT/PortCls) Sample: external/vendor/Windows-driver-samples/audio/sysvad/sysvad.sln

Refer to Sample-References.md for licensing policies and design guidelines.

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Next Steps: Build Verification in Dev VM

1. Resolve MSBuild WDK Integration: Run the Visual Studio Installer to ensure the WDK build tools workload or extension is registered so MSBuild can target Platform Toolset = 'WindowsKernelModeDriver10.0'.
2. Build Sample Solution: Try compiling the Microsoft ACX AudioCodec sample:

   MSBuild.exe external/vendor/Windows-driver-samples/audio/Acx/Samples/AudioCodec/Driver/AudioCodec.sln /p:Configuration=Debug /p:Platform=x64

3. Verify compilation succeeds on Host before editing the DAUx driver source skeletons.

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⚠️ WARNING: DO NOT INSTALL ON THE HOST

Caution

Under no circumstances should you run pnputil, enable testsigning, or register any compiled driver package (.sys/.inf) on your primary development host. Testing and loading drivers must only occur inside an isolated Test VM equipped with kernel debugging.