On Tue, 2005-02-22 at 10:55 -0700, tim_webb@agilent.com wrote:
> Excuse me for asking a stupid question, I too have not been following this thread..
> 
> Question:  What are VIDs?  Besides possibly an abbreviation for some component that I am not able to think of?

Well, VID stands for "vendor ID".

As to what it's used for: it's part of plug and play. When you plug a
USB device in the first thing the USB host does is ask the device for
it's VID and PID, this combination of numbers is compared to the USB
hosts database of devices. 

If it finds a match it loads that driver and the device is ready to use.

If it doesn't find a match you get the "find a driver" dialog
appropriate to your OS.

Having a VID/PID combination for your product guarantees that your
product won't "look" like anybody else's product.

FWIW this isn't a new concept, many other PC technologies use a similar
type of idea, PCI is probably the biggest. The mechanism is completely
different, but the idea is the same. TTYL


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