[Windows Seven] How to use biometric authentication in your .NET applications ?

Currently, most of the laptops have a lot of features (SmartCard reader, etc.) that are not used.

But, with Windows Seven, one of this feature appears more useful: biometric authentication. Indeed, for the moment, this authentication must be done with tiers softwares, developed by constructors.

But now, Windows Seven get a new API allowing the programmation/manipulation of biometric readers. So it's now possible, by playing with some PInvoke, to create a wrapper for the API.

To help you, I've managed to create this wrapper. For now, only the method WinBioIdentifyWithCallback is implemented but it should be quite easy to implement other. This method allows to check, asynchronously, that the user who have swipe his finger on the sensor is effectively a know user: 

In case of the user is unknow, the application receive an event which indicate the problem:

To use it, it's quite simple:

It's important to note that this wrapper is composed by 3 DLLs:

• Biometric.Wrapper.dll: It's the managed DLL calling the unmanaged methods
• Interop.WinBio.dll: This DLL contains the definition of the unmanaged methods (PInvoke). Instead of creating this DLL by hand, I've prefered to generate it by using the tool PInvoker. It's quick, workfs fine and, in case of any issue, tool's creator is really active so don't hesitate to give it a try !
• PInvoker.Marshal.dll: DLL generated by the tool PInvoker and which contains the definition of thetypes that are used in Interop.WinBio.dll

To give a try to this, just follow this link : http://morpheus.developpez.com/blog/BiometricWrapper/BiometricWrapper.zip

Have fun !

Bye