SCardIntroduceCardTypeA function (winscard.h)

Article
02/09/2023

The SCardIntroduceCardType function introduces a smart card to the smart card subsystem (for the active user) by adding it to the smart card database.

Syntax

LONG SCardIntroduceCardTypeA(
  [in]           SCARDCONTEXT hContext,
  [in]           LPCSTR       szCardName,
  [in, optional] LPCGUID      pguidPrimaryProvider,
  [in, optional] LPCGUID      rgguidInterfaces,
  [in]           DWORD        dwInterfaceCount,
  [in]           LPCBYTE      pbAtr,
  [in]           LPCBYTE      pbAtrMask,
  [in]           DWORD        cbAtrLen
);

Parameters

[in] hContext

Handle that identifies the resource manager context. The resource manager context is set by a previous call to SCardEstablishContext. This parameter cannot be NULL.

[in] szCardName

Name by which the user can recognize the card.

[in, optional] pguidPrimaryProvider

Pointer to the identifier (GUID) for the smart card's primary service provider.

[in, optional] rgguidInterfaces

Array of identifiers (GUIDs) that identify the interfaces supported by the smart card.

[in] dwInterfaceCount

Number of identifiers in the rgguidInterfaces array.

[in] pbAtr

ATR string that can be used for matching purposes when querying the smart card database (for more information, see SCardListCards). The length of this string is determined by normal ATR parsing.

[in] pbAtrMask

Optional bitmask to use when comparing the ATRs of smart cards to the ATR supplied in pbAtr. If this value is non-NULL, it must point to a string of bytes the same length as the ATR string supplied in pbAtr. When a given ATR string A is compared to the ATR supplied in pbAtr, it matches if and only if A & M = pbAtr, where M is the supplied mask, and & represents bitwise AND.

[in] cbAtrLen

Length of the ATR and optional ATR mask. If this value is zero, then the length of the ATR is determined by normal ATR parsing. This value cannot be zero if a pbAtr value is supplied.

Return value

This function returns different values depending on whether it succeeds or fails.

Return code	Description
Success	SCARD_S_SUCCESS.
Failure	An error code. For more information, see Smart Card Return Values.

Remarks

This function is not redirected, but calling the function when inside a Remote Desktop session will not result in an error. It only means that the result will be from the remote computer instead of the local computer.

The SCardIntroduceCardType function is a database management function. For more information on other database management functions, see Smart Card Database Management Functions.

To remove a smart card, use SCardForgetCardType.

Examples

The following example shows how to introduce a card type. The example assumes that hContext is a valid handle obtained from a previous call to the SCardEstablishContext function.

GUID  MyGuid = { 0xABCDEF00,
                 0xABCD,
                 0xABCD,
                 0xAA, 0xBB, 0xCC, 0xDD,
                 0xAA, 0xBB, 0xCC, 0xDD };

static const BYTE MyATR[] =     { 0xaa, 0xbb, 0xcc, 0x00, 0xdd };
static const BYTE MyATRMask[] = { 0xff, 0xff, 0xff, 0x00, 0xff};

LONG            lReturn;

lReturn = SCardIntroduceCardType(hContext, 
                                 L"MyCardName",
                                 &MyGuid,
                                 NULL,    // No interface array
                                 0,       // Interface count = 0
                                 MyATR,
                                 MyATRMask,
                                 sizeof(MyATR));
if ( SCARD_S_SUCCESS != lReturn )
    printf("Failed SCardIntroduceCardType\n");

Note

The winscard.h header defines SCardIntroduceCardType as an alias which automatically selects the ANSI or Unicode version of this function based on the definition of the UNICODE preprocessor constant. Mixing usage of the encoding-neutral alias with code that not encoding-neutral can lead to mismatches that result in compilation or runtime errors. For more information, see Conventions for Function Prototypes.

Requirements

Requirement	Value
Minimum supported client	Windows XP [desktop apps only]
Minimum supported server	Windows Server 2003 [desktop apps only]
Target Platform	Windows
Header	winscard.h
Library	Winscard.lib
DLL	Winscard.dll