Abstract:The automatic updating method of Linux device drivers is studied and the corresponding assisted updating model based on source codes is built while a set of tools to support automatic updating of drivers are designed and implemented. This set of tools includes a tool to extract kernel-dependent interfaces for the Linux device drivers, a tool to analyze differences between kernel-dependent interfaces for two versions of kernels, and a tool to generate helpful information for updating of device drivers. Related prototypes have been tested and the results show that it can effectively improve the development and maintenance of device drivers. In addition, the concepts and calculation methods for the rate of false reporting and the rate of missing reporting about helpful information for updating are put forward, which are to be used for the quantitative indicators to evaluate assisted updating for device drivers.