Why create a device driver?

A hardware driver is a small piece of software that allows a computer program to communicate with a specific device, for example a controller, in the Control4 system. Every device in the Control4 system requires a driver, and that driver must be added to the project tree in Composer Pro. Some devices do not have existing drivers in the Composer Pro driver database, or the drivers there cannot control a device. In that case, a new device driver needs to be created. Control4 provides the means if anyone wants to develop drivers for their products.

Example: A computer may use a printer driver to send a print order to a printer. Every controllable device uses codes that represent commands on that device. To control the device, you must capture or enter these codes in the driver.

Example: An IR-controlled CD player’s commands are Play, Stop, Pause, etc. Using the Driver Wizard and controller hardware along with the manufacturer’s remote control supplied with the equipment, you can capture these codes and build a working driver using the codes. Serial-based devices are also supported; you can enter the serial codes to the Driver Wizard manually.

Tip: Each driver consists of a collection of files. One of those files is a configuration file, which is an XML file referred to as a config data file or.c4i file. This file provides specific IR, serial, or connection codes that are pertinent to supporting a device model on the Control4 system. In the default Composer Pro installation, these files are located on your PC at: c:\program files\control4\Composerxxx\drivers\virtual.