Getting Started Using Infedit

This topic illustrates the use of Infedit by starting with a list of Windows 95 installation and operating requirements for a fictitious hardware device (a SCSI adapter) and then showing how to use Infedit to build an INF file that meets these requirements. A listing of the completed INF file produced by Infedit is shown at the end of the section.

After the Windows 95 DDK is installed, you can run Infedit from the Windows 95 Run dialog. Infedit is installed in the directory %DDKROOT%\BIN.

To build a new INF file, select the New option from the File menu.

The opening screen is displayed, which shows all the types of INF file sections you can build with Infedit. To get started on a new INF file, build the Manufacturer section first. Once you have put a Company Name item into the Manufacturer section, you can save the INF file and reopen it at any time to build the other sections.

This chapter shows how to build an INF file for a SCSI adapter made by Corporation X. To put a Company Name item with the value "Corporation X" into the Manufacturer section, do the following with Infedit:

1. Right-click on the Manufacturer folder to display a popup menu.

2. From the popup menu, select the New Manufacturer option. A New Manufacturer sub folder is displayed.

3. Double-click on the new sub folder to get an opportunity to edit the Company Name item. On the right side of the screen, in the Item column of the edit area, the item name "Company Name" appears.

4. Double-click on the item "Company Name" and an Edit String dialog will be displayed that enables you to enter "Corporation X" as the value for the New Company item.

Once you have put the Company Name item into the Manufacturer section, you can save and name the INF file using the Save As option from the File menu. The example INF file discussed in this chapter is named XSCSI.INF.

The operations shown above that are used to navigate the Infedit interface in the process of putting the Company Name item into the New Manufacturer subfolder are used to put other types of items into other types of sub folders. Each subfolder represents an INF file section. The general operations used repeatedly in the Infedit user interface are:

The Infedit interface also presents a screen area dedicated to editing item values. This screen area is organized as two columns. The left-most column lists the names of all the items that can be in the section you are editing. The right-most column lists the current value of each item. Double-click on an item name to display the edit dialog you need to change the current value of the item.

Note that once you have built the Manufacturer section of the INF file, you can build the rest of the sections in almost any sequence. You do not have to completely finish building a section before you start on another one, either. The following example will show the INF file sections being built in a particular sequence, but that is not the only sequence that can be used.