Retrieves the serial number string from a connected device.

C# Signature:

[DllImport("hid.dll", SetLastError=true)]
static extern bool HidD_GetSerialNumberString(IntPtr HidDeviceObject, byte[] Buffer, Int32 BufferLength);

VB Signature:

Declare Function HidD_GetSerialNumberString Lib "hid.dll" (TODO) As TODO

User-Defined Types:

None.

Alternative Managed API:

Do you know one? Please contribute it!

Notes:

None.

Tips & Tricks:

The string that is returned is unicode and therefore needs to be converted for most use cases.

Sample Code:

string devicePath = "<your device path>";

// Open the device

deviceHandle = CreateFile(devicePath, GENERIC_READ | GENERIC_WRITE, FILE_SHARE_READ | FILE_SHARE_WRITE, IntPtr.Zero, OPEN_EXISTING, FILE_FLAG_OVERLAPPED, IntPtr.Zero);

string sn = "";

byte[] buffer = new byte[128];

// attempt to read the serial number string

if (HidD_GetSerialNumberString(HIDDeviceHandle, buffer, buffer.Length))

{

    // convert from unicode to the default encoding
    sn = Encoding.Default.GetString(Encoding.Convert(Encoding.Unicode, Encoding.Default, buffer));

}

// Clear out the '\0' characters

sn = sn.Remove(sn.IndexOf('\0'));