Architectural Description

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[Function Discovery is available for use in the following versions of Windows: Windows Server 2012, Windows 8, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows 7, Windows Server 2008, and Windows Vista. It may be altered or unavailable in subsequent versions.]

Function Discovery provides a programmatic interface for enumerating system resources. This interface serves as an abstraction layer over device- and network-specific programming interfaces. The following diagram illustrates the Function Discovery architecture.

function discovery architecture

Function Discovery supports an extensible discovery provider model. All enumerated resources are discovered through one of the built-in providers or a custom provider. For more information about implementing a custom provider, see Function Discovery Providers.

Function Discovery supports a query service, through which a client application can obtain a pointer to a COM interface that it can use to use or control the device or resource.

Unifying the Discovery Process