INFO: NDIS Kernel Debugger Extensions

ID: Q248413

The information in this article applies to:

Microsoft Windows 2000

SUMMARY

Windows2000 DDK contains a new NDIS kernel debugger extension DLL to facilitate examination of a wider range of NDIS kernel data structures, and enable debug tracing of various NDIS components on the checked build of NDIS.sys.

MORE INFORMATION

Installing the NDIS Debugger Extensions

To install the extension, copy the Ndiskd.dll from \ntddk\bin\w2kfre or \ntddk\bin\w2kchk depending on the target computer's build to the same directory as Windbg.exe or i386kd.exe. Then, copy the corresponding NDIS.sys symbols files (Ndis.pdb and Ndis.dbg) to the host computer's symbols directory.

Using the NDIS Debugger Extensions

To use the new extensions, the debuggers offer two methods. At the command prompt, after establishing a session, enter:

!ndiskd.extension_name [arguments] The debugger loads Ndiskd.dll, calls the entry point (extension_name) specified, and passes arguments to the entry point.

!load ndiskd.dll The debugger loads Ndiskd.dll, but does not call the entry point.

In either case, once the debugger has loaded Ndiskd.dll, you can run any extension command contained in it by using only the extension's name:


!extension name

NOTE: When you run an extension without specifying the .dll, the debugger looks for it in the current extension .dll, which is the last one loaded. If it does not find the extension in the current extension .dll, it searches through the loaded extension .dlls, in the order that they were loaded, and runs the first instance of the extension that it finds.

Quick Help

For a quick reference of all the extensions name, enter !help at the WinDbg command line after loading the Ndiskd.dll. The information that appears will be similar to the following:


!ndiskd.help
Ndis extensions:
   dbglevel [Level [Level] ...]        toggle debug level
   dbgsystems [Level [Level] ...]      toggle debug systems
   miniports <'all'>                   list all Miniports
   gminiports <'all'>                  list all Miniports, even those not started yet
   miniport <Miniport Block>           dump Miniport block
   mopen <Miniport Open Block>         dump Miniport Open block
   protocols                           dump all protocols and their opens
   protocol <Protocol Block>           dump the protocols block's contents
   pkt <Packet> <Verbosity>            dump the contents of the packet
   int_ctxt <NDIS_MINIPORT_INTERRUPT*> dump the second argument of ndisMIsr
   pktpool <pointer to Pkt_Pool> <Num> dump the contents of the ndis_pkt_pool. Not for Alpha and Win64

Enable NDIS Debug Tracing

!dbglevel and !dbgsystem

You can enable different levels of debug tracing in various components of NDIS by using these two extensions. These extensions require a CHECKED version of NDIS.sys on the target system. Instead of installing an entire checked build system, you can also just copy the checked build of NDIS.sys to get debug tracing. The "dbgsystem" lets you chose the various NDIS components and the "dbglevel" determines the level or amount of debug tracing in the selected components.


>!dbglevel
Current setting:   INFO

Available settings:
  LOG  WARN  ERR  FATAL

>!dbgsystems
Current settings:
Available settings:
  INIT  CONFIG  SEND  RECV  PROTOCOL
  BIND  BUS_QUERY  REGISTRY  MEMORY  FILTER
  REQUEST  WORK_ITEM  PNP  PM  OPEN
  LOCKS  RESET  WMI  NDIS_CO  REFERENCE

You can also enable debug tracing through the registry by adding the following values to the HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\NDIS\Parameters key.


"DebugLevel"=dword:00000000
"DebugSystems"=dword:000030F3
"DebugBreakPoint"=dword:00000001

Acceptable values for DebugLevel and DebugSystems are in the following list. The DebugBreakPoint, if set to 1, causes NDIS to debug break in it's DriverEntry.


DebugLevel:

 DBG_LEVEL_INFO    0x00000000
 DBG_LEVEL_WARN    0x00001000
 DBG_LEVEL_ERR     0x00002000
 DBG_LEVEL_FATAL   0x00003000

DebugSystems:

 DBG_COMP_INIT         0x00000001
 DBG_COMP_CONFIG       0x00000002
 DBG_COMP_SEND         0x00000004
 DBG_COMP_RECV         0x00000008
 DBG_COMP_MEMORY       0x00000010
 DBG_COMP_FILTER       0x00000020
 DBG_COMP_PROTOCOL     0x00000040
 DBG_COMP_REQUEST      0x00000080
 DBG_COMP_UNLOAD       0x00000100
 DBG_COMP_WORK_ITEM    0x00000200
 DBG_COMP_OPEN         0x00000400
 DBG_COMP_LOCKS        0x00000800
 DBG_COMP_ALL          0xFFFFFFFF

This registry technique is useful if you don't have the checked symbols of NDIS.sys. One drawback is that you have to restart your system every time you change the values.

REFERENCES

For additional information, please see the following article(s) in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

Q164459 HOWTO: Debugging NDIS 4.0 Drivers

Additional query words:

Keywords : kbDDK kbDebug kbKMode kbNDIS kbWinOS2000 kbDSupport kbGrpNTDDK
Version : WINDOWS:
Platform : WINDOWS
Issue type : kbinfo