Getting Started Please

  • Thread starter Thread starter Steve
  • Start date Start date
S

Steve

Hello,

I am just getting started with PDA (PocketPC) development
and am finding it difficult to find answers to some of my
questions. I would appreciate any help/links with answers
to the following:-

Networking:

Does the framework know when it is connected to a network
or stored in the cradle. Ideally I would need to know
programaticaly if I am connected to a wireless LAN or a
cradle.

Can the PDA reside on the network as a device in its own
right, or does it need to be linked to a PC?

Deploying:

When deploying an application does it reside volatile ram
or rom/memory card? What happens when battery power
goes/switched off etc..

Is it possible to configure the platform to run your
application on startup.


Many thanks for any help given.
 
Steve,

Networking -- The device, at the operating system level, knows whether it is
presently connected in some fashion, but, usually, it's beneficial for the
application to *ignore* this fact. That is, you write your code and don't
care whether you're cradled or connected via wired Ethernet or 802.11. When
you attempt a Web service connection or a socket connection or whatever, the
OS handles sending the data in the best way possible and you can ignore what
way that is. Here's a thread concerning detecting when the device is
cradled from the archives:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=...soft.public.dotnet.framework.compactframework

The PPC can be a network device, if it has a network card. You can't share
files and folders *from* the PPC, but it can access network shares from
desktop machines, etc.

Deployment -- Generally, the application will be deployed to the RAM
filesystem, which disappears when the batteries go completely dead. You
*may* be able to install some pieces to a storage card, but that would
assume that you know that your target device has one at all. Most PPC
devices don't, unless installed by the owner.

Yes, it's possible to configure the PPC to run an application at startup.
You have to be careful about what you mean by startup, however, since most
PPC devices wouldn't be rebooted every time you push the power button.
They'd just be resumed from suspend mode. There's been a lot of traffic
about running applications at startup, on certain events, at certain times,
in the past. You might check the archives for this, as well as the Windows
CE, newsgroup:

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=...soft.public.dotnet.framework.compactframework

http://groups.google.com/groups?hl=en&group=microsoft.public.windowsce

Paul T.
 
Steve,

Welcome! I'll try to answer your questions.

You can detect the cradle programmatically. Here is a discussion from
groups.google.com on that topic:
http://groups.google.com/groups?q=c...=#[email protected]&rnum=5

The device has its own IP address and can connect to the network without being
connected to a PC.

Usually when you deploy an app to the device, it resides in RAM. Your app will
survive a power off or soft reset but will disappear with a cold boot. Some
manufacturers provide a utiltiy that allows you to flash your app and any DLLs
it needs into RAM, and this allows your app to survive even a cold boot.

You can indeed configure the device to run your app on startup. Alternatively
you can create a shortcut to your app which displays as an icon on the device
desktop.
 
Paul,

Thanks for your reply that was very informative.

Do you have any recomended resources for
designing/developing PocketPC applications.

Regards
Steve
 
Not "designing", so much, although there are no doubt Microsoft design
guides for that, probably on MSDN.

OpenNetCF is the best resource for utilities for building .NET CF
applications: www.opennetcf.org.

Paul T.
 
The Microsoft .NET Compact Framework (Core Reference) is also very good...
It has examples for SQL CE, threading and more.

Rick Winscot
rickly@zyche dot com
 
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