If you can afford it, order the Windows Server 2003 DDK (includes Windows XP DDK which should include DX DDK).

It's $0.00 + S/H.

EDIT: It contains sample drivers for the Permedia 2 and 3. Old, but still very interesting stuff.

Quote:Original post by Coder
You know, Dustin. If you keep mentioning this universal subscription long enough, I'll kill you someday and scavenge it from your body (You do carry the "subscription badge" on you, don't you? And it does come with a badge, right?) [grin]

I think a badge is about the only thing it doesn't come with. I don't even know what half of this stuff is. But it sure is spiffy!

Quote:Original post by Donavon Keithley
EDIT: It contains sample drivers for the Permedia 2 and 3. Old, but still very interesting stuff.

Awesome, I didn't know it had any example drivers - I'll have to check that out.

Quote:I'll kill you someday and scavenge it from your body

circlesoft hires Rocky as his body guard.[wink]

Quote:I don't even know what half of this stuff is. But it sure is spiffy!

You mean you aren't using Windows Services for UNIX and BizTalk server!? C'mon man, be reasonable!

It's probably worth noting that only older DirectX DDKs are available with a MSDN Universal subscription. To obtain a newer DDK (such as for DirectX 9), you need to apply to Microsoft separately and sign a separate NDA.

As for deciding to learn to write drivers only because there seems to be a few jobs in that area at the moment isn't very good career planning.

Generally you'd come into that industry from some other route than teaching yourself with the DDK (that doesn't have too much value with an employer compared to experience/knowledge gained through a university course (EE, computer science etc or previous employment doing something similar).

Graduate jobs do come up at those types of company - though it's better in the long run to do a degree, get a graduate job in a related industry and then make moves when you have real **experience** [not many companies are going to trust you to write kernel mode drivers capable of crashing a machine etc unless they see some track record (academic and/or work experience).

Quote:Original post by S1CA
It's probably worth noting that only older DirectX DDKs are available with a MSDN Universal subscription. To obtain a newer DDK (such as for DirectX 9), you need to apply to Microsoft separately and sign a separate NDA.

Wouldn't the Windows XP DDK be recent enough to have DX9 info in it? The XP DDK is included in MSDN Universal.

Yeah I'm not sure that's accurate but I don't have the 2003 DDK. I have XP SP1, which has DX8 (and was built before DX9 went final). The latest docs include the DX9 DDK and there's this statement on one of the pages:

"The Europa sample is included with the DirectX 9 DDK and the Windows Server 2003 SP1 DDK."

which could be implying that the 2003 DDK includes DX9.

Simon, could you be thinking of the reference rasterizer source code? I know that requires a separate license agreement.