Application Compatibility Test Rig (ACT-R)

Updated: July 15, 2002

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  Background
  Goal and objective
  Creating and owning ACT-R applications
  To get started

Background

Display drivers are one of the causes of catastrophic failures of systems that run Microsoft Windows, even those with drivers that pass the current set of Windows Logo Program tests. The Application Compatibility Test Rig (ACT-R) was created to detect these failures. Customers experience difficulties while running real applications rather than tests, so adding third-party application compatibility to the suite of tests is expected to reduce the number of system failures that are caused by third-party applications.

Microsoft cannot create enough tests to cover the variety of usage scenarios that independent software vendors (ISVs) develop, nor could the tests be kept up to date. The current feature tests continue to provide the best possible code and API coverage while they look for inaccurate rendering, but Microsoft recognizes that drivers often fail when features are used in unpredictable combinations and when the driver is in an unpredictable state. Leveraging third-party applications gives us driver coverage that is meaningful to end users.

Using third-party applications as tests also allows Microsoft to be cutting-edge and true-to-life in our coverage of display drivers. This system allows for testing not only popular games and applications that millions of users want to run on the IHVs' hardware but applications that are written by ISVs and that use Microsoft DirectX.

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Goal and objective

The ACT-R program's goal is to leverage third-party applications that use Microsoft DirectX to validate that the output generated by the display driver meets reasonable expectations for reliability and conformance as defined by the requirements of the Windows Logo Program for Hardware. The third-party applications must meet the requirements described in the "Application requirements" section later in this paper.

The objective of testing with third-party applications is to increase the reliability of display drivers that receive the "Designed for Windows" logo by ensuring that the drivers can run a gamut of applications without crashing or exhibiting gross rendering defects. This testing will not add any manual testing to the test kit. It will raise the bar for driver reliability and increase the credibility of the testing required for the "Designed for Windows" logo.

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Creating and owning ACT-R applications

The applications chosen for the ACT-R tests will be demonstration software that requires little or no installation and that runs in a performance or frame-perfect mode, similar to the benchmark demonstration software that many ISVs release today. The value of these applications to ISVs is significant; ISVs whose applications are accepted into the program can be confident that devices that receive the "Designed for Windows" logo have run their demonstration applications without crashing or exhibiting gross rendering errors in the sample frame. Developing these demonstration applications could increase product support savings and reduce product returns.

Application requirements

To qualify for ACT-R, applications must:

• Be fully automated or driven by a script.

• Produce the same output, frame for frame, every time it is run (effects must not have any random elements like those found in fire or sparks, for example).

• Have no licensing restrictions that would prevent Microsoft from including the application in a Microsoft test kit.

• Include an automated setup that doesn't require any user interaction. Ideally, it would simply be a directory of files requiring no setup or a single executable with resources built into it, like the DirectX samples.

• Not do dynamic performance scaling. Some applications include dynamic performance scaling to try to maintain consistent frame rates as demands on the CPU or GPU change.

• Pass a set of tests administered by Microsoft to ascertain its readiness for use in a test kit.

Software vendor requirements

The requirements for vendors submitting ACT-R applications include the following:

• The vendor agrees to the licensing agreement allowing for Microsoft's distribution of the application in conjunction with the "Designed for Windows" logo program.

• The vendor shall designate a business contact for issues related to the use of the application in a Microsoft test kit.

• The application owner agrees to respond within 48 business hours of any inquiry.

General

• Submitting an application does not guarantee that it will be included in any Microsoft test kit.

• Microsoft reserves the right to remove an application from a test kit or discontinue its use as a requirement in an existing test kit at any time for any reason.

• Microsoft makes no claims that including an application as a test will affect the way a driver that has received the "Designed for Windows" logo will behave when running the application.

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To get started

To begin the process of submitting an ACT-R application, contact actr@microsoft.com

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