Introduction to WIA

The Microsoft Windows Image Acquisition (WIA) interface is both an application programming interface (API) and a device driver interface (DDI). The WIA API is designed to allow applications to:

• Run in a robust and stable environment.

• Minimize interoperability problems.

• Enumerate available image acquisition devices.

• Create connections to multiple devices simultaneously.

• Query properties of devices in a standard and expandable manner.

• Acquire device data using standard and high performance transfer mechanisms.

• Maintain image properties across data transfers.

• Be notified of a wide variety of device events.

The WIA DDI is designed to minimize the amount of code a hardware vendor must write, while maintaining the flexibility to craft individual solutions. This is accomplished by:

• Providing a standard device service library that performs most driver operations.

• Promoting industry device communications standards, such as the Picture Transfer Protocol (PTP), so that one WIA driver supports most WIA devices.

This section presents a brief overview of WIA in the following areas:

WIA Architecture Overview

WIA Core Components