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OEM Adaptation Layer

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Windows Mobile Not SupportedWindows Embedded CE Supported

8/27/2008

An OEM adaptation layer (OAL) is a layer of code that logically resides between the Windows Embedded CE kernel and the hardware of your target device. Physically, the OAL is linked with the kernel libraries to create the kernel executable file.

The OAL facilitates communication between your operating system (OS) and your target device and includes code to handle interrupts, timers, power management, bus abstraction, generic I/O control codes (IOCTLs), and so on.

Creating the OAL is one of the more complex tasks in the process of getting a Windows Embedded CEā€“based OS to run on a new hardware platform. In general, the easiest way to create an OAL is to copy the OAL implementation from a working OS design, and then modify it to suit the specific requirements of your hardware platform.

If you must create an OAL from the beginning, the task can be greatly simplified by approaching the development process in stages. Each stage adds a little more functionality than the previous one and provides a convenient separation point where new functionality can be fixed and validated before proceeding to the next step.

For more information on how to develop an OAL, see How to Develop an OEM Adaptation Layer.

See Also

Reference

OEM Adaptation Layer Reference

Concepts

Board Support Package Overview
Boot Loaders
Kernel Image Libraries
Kernel Scheduler
Kernel States
Kernel Independent Transport Layer

Other Resources

Kernel Overview