I am attempting to communicate over serial with a USB-C device and an M-Series iPad. I have proven the device to communicate as expected (baud rate, parity, etc) via a Swift app on Mac using a third party library (IOKit) that utilizes the "AppleUSBACM (v5.0.0)" driver on macOS. I am looking to recreate this communication via iPadOS and a custom DriverKit driver that provides this same interface. There is not an example from Apple for serial communication and DriverKit but there is a couple for communicating from an app to the dext, and for other networking examples. There are also other mentions in WWDC videos but they are incomplete and do not provide the needed structure. Communicating between a driver extension and a client app Connecting a network driver Bring your driver to iPad with DriverKit System Extensions and DriverKit My question revolves around architecture and how to set up a driver for these needs. I have gotten the examples to run and understand what is needed for entitlements and other local signing needs. But what I don't understand is if you need a basic setup similar to the "Communicating between a driver extension and a client app" where your base driver subclasses IOService and has two arms. One that subclasses IOUserclient and allows communication between the dext and your Swift app. And another arm that subclasses IOUserSerial or IOUserUSBSerial. I assume then that these two share buffers of memory set up by the base class that allows communication between the two. I have had little luck getting IOUserUSBSerial to compile and have made more progress on IOUserSerial. But when running that and with the supposed idVendor plist entry I am not getting that part of the dext to start or recognize when the USB device is plugged in. Long story short, I'm looking for a basic architecture or example reference to explain serial communication in DriverKit. Devices: Custom USB-C hardware that is CDC ACM compliant iPad Air 5th gen with M1 chip (iPadOS 17.2) M1 MBP (macOS 14.2.1)

Hi @eskimo! With the introduction of USB-C ports on the newest iPhones, will there be any support for DriverKit (or USBSerialDriverKit 🤞) similar to the USB-C iPads? We are wanting to enable serial communication with a custom USB peripheral via the new USB-C port. Is this (or will this) be possible in any manor? Additionally, will this require MFi certification? Thanks!

Hello, We have a device that acts as a ***** device and communicates with a master over data sent over a USB serial port over a wired connection. We are trying to develop an Application on iOS that will enable us to use the USB connection between iPhone and our device. Kindly suggest to us what is the way to achieve this. A few searches let us know that Apple's MFi program needs to be enrolled. Please let us know how this works and where could we find process for the same. I thank you in advance! Makarand

I am using a Silicon labs CP2102 chip. I have configured a custom USB VID and PID on the chip, and want to create a MacOs driver (or rather map this custom VID/PID to an existing driver) to make it accessible as a USB serial device from my Mac. Preferably I'd like to map my device to the com.apple.DriverKit-AppleUSBSLCOM.dext driver, but I think the generic USB serial driver (com.apple.DriverKit-AppleUSBSerial.dext) should work too. Silabs also has their own driver (com.silabs.cp210x.dext, downloadable from their web page), if for some reason it is easier to map to that than to one of the native drivers that could also work. Based on https://developer.apple.com/documentation/kernel/implementing_drivers_system_extensions_and_kexts#3616855 and https://developer.apple.com/documentation/driverkit/creating_a_driver_using_the_driverkit_sdk it should be possible to create a codeless dext, which just inherits from e.g. IOUserUSBSerial. I've tried both creating just a DriverKit driver and putting it under /Library/DriverExtensions/ and creating a (default) app and adding a DriverKit driver to it, and putting the app in my /Applications/ folder, but neither works for me. My driver implementation is just this: #include <USBSerialDriverKit/IOUserUSBSerial.iig> class MyDriver: public IOUserUSBSerial { }; and my IOKitPersonalities looks like this: <key>IOKitPersonalities</key> <dict> <key>MyDriver</key> <dict> <key>CFBundleIdentifier</key> <string>com.mydriver.MyDriverApp.MyDriver</string> <key>IOClass</key> <string>IOUserUSBSerial</string> <key>IOMatchCategory</key> <string>com.mydriver.MyDriverApp.MyDriver</string> <key>IOProviderClass</key> <string>IOUSBHostInterface</string> <key>IOUserClass</key> <string>MyDriver</string> <key>IOUserServerName</key> <string>com.mydriver.MyDriverApp.MyDriver</string> <key>bConfigurationValue</key> <integer>1</integer> <key>bInterfaceNumber</key> <integer>0</integer> <key>idProduct</key> <integer>(my custom PID, decimal value)</integer> <key>idVendor</key> <integer>(my custom VID, decimal value)</integer> </dict> </dict> I've disabled SIP and enabled developer mode (systemextensionsctl developer on), though I'm not sure if it's needed. I've scanned through the system logs and looked at the ioreg output. When I connect a CP2102 chip with default VID and PID, I can see that it maps to the native com.apple.DriverKit-AppleUSBSLCOM.dext driver. When I connect the same chip with my custom VID and PID, I don't see any trace of my driver being used. I can see it in the System Information app, but it doesn't map to my driver. I'm currently suspecting it is an Entitlements issue. In my app I have an Entitlements file, where I've added DriverKit USB Transport and DriverKit Serial Family. Do I need something like this for the driver target? There is no default Entitlements file there, but maybe I should create one? Or is there something else I'm missing? I've also noted one odd thing: When I install my app I can see a system log entry, complaining that "package type not SYSX" (for my driver). But I don't think it should be a SYSX package? It's currently specified as a DEXT package.

I can't find any useful help about the content described in the title on Apple's official website. The relevant help on its official website is almost all based on OC language, and even their sample programs are written in OC language. Can I ask if SWIFT can only use the COM port through the bridge of OC-SWIFT?

I am trying to read/write from/to a Bluetooth device that has SPP(Serial port profile) from Python in Mac OSX. Could you recommend any good library to do so? I have been trying for long but the solutions I have tried does not work. Any help would be greatly appreciated!