The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document.
The patent badge is an abbreviated version of the USPTO patent document. The patent badge covers the following: Patent number, Date patent was issued, Date patent was filed, Title of the patent, Applicant, Inventor, Assignee, Attorney firm, Primary examiner, Assistant examiner, CPCs, and Abstract. The patent badge does contain a link to the full patent document (in Adobe Acrobat format, aka pdf). To download or print any patent click here.
Patent No.:
Date of Patent:
Sep. 15, 1998
Filed:
Jun. 07, 1995
Moshe Lichtman, Bellevue, WA (US);
Mark R Enstrom, Redmond, WA (US);
Thomas E Lennon, Seattle, WA (US);
Ralph A Lipe, Woodinville, WA (US);
Pierre-Yves Santerre, Bellevue, WA (US);
Robert T Short, Kirkland, WA (US);
David W Voth, Redmond, WA (US);
Microsoft Corporation, Redmond, WA (US);
Abstract
A system for managing the configuration of devices of a computer system. Device information is obtained to uniquely identify each device and to describe the device characteristics associated with device operation. To obtain device information, a particular device is detected on a selected system bus and thereafter assigned an identification code that uniquely identifies the detected device. A system bus code, which uniquely identifies the selected system bus, is appended to the identification code, thereby forming a device identification code associated with the particular device. Logical configuration data, which supplies configuration requirements for device operation, is also obtained for the detected device. This data collection process is repeated until device information is obtained for each of the devices connected to the selected system bus. Resources are allocated to each device based on the device identification code and the logical configuration data. This resource allocation process prevents a potential conflicting use of the resources by the devices. A device driver, which enables communications between the corresponding device and the computer system, is identified and loaded for each of the devices in response to the device information. If the computer system contains more than one system bus, then the tasks of collecting device information, allocating resources, and identifying and loading device drivers are completed for each of the remaining system buses.