Tools for minifilter development and testing

This page lists a few tools that are specifically for developing a minifilter. Minifilter driver developers are also encouraged to use other driver development tools available through the Windows Driver Kit (WDK).

Fltmc.exe Command

The Fltmc.exe program is a system-supplied command line utility for common minifilter driver management operations. Developers can use Fltmc.exe to load and unload minifilter drivers, attach or detach minifilter drivers from volumes, and enumerate minifilter drivers, instances, and volumes. In a command prompt with administrator privileges, type fltmc help to see the full list of commands.

Fsutil.exe Command

The Fsutil.exe program is a system-supplied command line utility that performs various operations on files. Developers can type fsutil file layout foo.md to pretty-print all the details of a file, such as its attributes, time stamps, streams, and so forth.

!fltkd Debugger Extension

The !fltkd debugger extension is provided in the Windows Debugging tools. Commonly used commands include the following:

Command	Description
!cbd	The filter manager equivalent of !irp
!filter	Lists detailed information about the specified filter
!filters	Lists all attached minifilter drivers
!frames	Lists all filter manager frames and attached minifilter drivers
!instance	Lists detailed information about the specified instance
!volume	Lists detailed information about the specified volume
!volumes	Lists all volumes and attached minifilter driver instances

In WinDbg, type !fltkd.help for a full list of commands.

Filter Verifier

Filter Verifier is an I/O Verification option in Driver Verifier that validates minifilter driver usage of filter manager functions. Filter Verifier is installed with the filter manager. Developers should always develop minifilter drivers with Driver Verifier and Filter Verifier enabled.

To use Filter Verifier, specify the minifilter driver's name and enable the I/O Verification option in Driver Verifier (Verifier.exe). Verification starts when the minifilter driver registers with the filter manager.

Filter Verifier validates the following usage in a minifilter driver:

• Correct use of parameters and calling context
• Correct return values from preoperation and postoperation callback routines
• Consistent and coherent changes to parameters in callback data

Filter Verifier tracks the following filter manager objects:

• Contexts
• Callback Data structures
• Queued Work Items
• NameInformation structures
• File Objects
• Filter Objects
• Instance Objects
• Volume Objects

In a command prompt, type verifier /? to see syntax and a full list of parameters.