Safely remove a USB drive using the Win32 API?

Question

How do I remove a USB drive using the Win32 API? I do a lot of work on embedded systems and on one of these I have to copy my programs on a USB stick and insert it into the target hardware.

Since I mostly work on the console I don't like to use the mouse and click on the small task-bar icon hundred times a day.

I'd love to write a little program to do exactly that so I can put it into my makefiles, but I haven't found any API call that does the same thing.

Any ideas?

Solution 1

You can use the CM_Request_Device_Eject() function as well as some other possibilities. Consult the following projects and articles:

DevEject: Straightforward. http://www.withopf.com/tools/deveject/

A useful CodeProject article: http://www.codeproject.com/KB/system/RemoveDriveByLetter.aspx

Solution 2

It looks like Sync lets you specify -e to eject removable drives. While not a win32 API, you could probably just call sync -e [drive_letter] from your makefile.

Solution 3

Here is a technet article about removable storage media. Look for DismountNtmsMedia.

Solution 4

Here's a solution in Delphi, that I've modified and put into a service for use in a very large enterprise. Go to: link text

Look for "scapi (Setup & Config Manager API)", and download it. There will be a demo program called USBView that will get you on your way. If you have Delphi, this also includes a TUSBDeviceTree component that you can use to gather information about a USB device when.

Regards

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