.Net Compact Framework 2.0 SP1 Ships With 'Install To Storage Card' Support!

[Rocco Augusto]

<div class='os_post_top_link'><a href='http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0c1b0a88-59e2-4eba-a70e-4cd851c5fcc4&DisplayLang=en' target='_blank'>http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=0c1b0a88-59e2-4eba-a70e-4cd851c5fcc4&DisplayLang=en</a><br /><br /></div>"<i>For developers such as myself, the memory requirement of .net CF 2.0 placed upon an already limited resource (particularly on Smartphone) has always been off putting. In fact, to date I have been still developing in .net CF 1.0, purely because of this problem. Installation to Storage Card resolves this issue, and is a very welcome change!</i>"<br /><br /> <img src="http://www.smartphonethoughts.com/images/dotnetcf.jpg" alt="User submitted image" title="User submitted image"/> <br /><br />There are so many programs out there for the Smartphone that I would love to test out and have not touched for the simple fact that they require .Net CF 2.0. On a clean install Microsoft's .Net Compact Framework took up nearly 9MB's of space! Now that we have the option to install the framework to our memory cards I can finally get around to playing with all those programs I have been missing out on. :)

[Kris Kumar]

This is awesome! Not only can we enjoy existing .NET CF 2.0 apps but the developers will now be encouraged to write more .NET CF 2.0 based apps. .NET CF 2.0 is much more flexible and powerful compared to the .NET CF 1.0 SP1 that ships with our Smartphones.

I had posted the news of the .NET CF 2.0 SP1 a week or so ago, but didn't realize that one of the new features enabled the whole .NET CF to run from the memory card. :oops:

[Rocco Augusto]

i didnt realize it either until i read paul's post. im excitied, now i can FINALLY start playing with woize (http://www.woize.com/) :D

[Jerry Raia]

It's about time they did this!

[toby]

Any idea on how I could install this using a Mac? I installed it on my XP partition using Parallels, but I can't seem to get the smartphone to connect to the virtual machine over usb...I found the following folder:

C:\Program Files\Microsoft.NET\SDK\CompactFramework\v2.0\WindowsCE\wce500\

Could I transfer the correct files from there over to the card? Or is there a cab installer anywhere? Thanks for your help.

[mboone]

This page tells which cab files go with what devices:

http://blogs.msdn.com/netcfteam/archive/2005/10/11/479793.aspx

[Kris Kumar]

Could I transfer the correct files from there over to the card? Or is there a cab installer anywhere? Thanks for your help.

You can find the CAB based installer in this folder on the XP machine on which you installed the .NET CF 2.0 SP1.
C:\Program Files\Microsoft.NET\SDK\CompactFramework\v2.0\WindowsCE\wce500\armv4i
Look for the file named NETCFv2.WM.armv4i.cab. Be careful, there are two CABs, one called NETCFv2.WM.xxxxxx and the other NETCFv2.WCE5.xxxxx, you obviously need the "WM" one. :-)

[Kris Kumar]

This page tells which cab files go with what devices:

http://blogs.msdn.com/netcfteam/archive/2005/10/11/479793.aspx

Thanks for posting this page. I was looking for this post. Then decided to go look in file system itself. Glad that the file I mentioned is the one for the WM Smartphone. :)

[toby]

awesome, thanks guys!

[prismejon]

Hmmm, I can't install this on my Qtek 8310 (iMate SP5). Apparently I don't have enough free space, but I haven't almost installed anything in main memory. I tried clearing the IE cache, but still not enough free space. Any suggestions? Btw, what version of .NET CF is included by default in WM5?

EDIT: I found some huge wav-files, that should solve it :D , but still only 6mb free before installing CF...

[Mike Temporale]

WinMo5 devices have 1.1 or 1.0 in them. :(

[bdipert]

Folks, I can't get this installed on my iMate SP5m, even if I specify the storage card (1 GByte miniSD with plenty of empty space available) as the destination. My current specs: available storage 6.66 MBytes, total storage 17.94 MBytes, available memory 25.24 MBytes, total memory 44.69 MBytes. I suspect my very large Outlook contacts database isn't helping matters, but there's really nothing I can do about that. Have already cleared the IE cache, all third-party programs are installed to the storage card. Ideas? Thanks in advance!

[bdipert]

I figgered it out ;-) I found the CAB file on my PC's HDD, copied it to the miniSD card, and ran it from there.

I only had around 6.7 MBytes free on the Smartphone's native storage memory prior to my earlier install attempt. Running the MSI installer automatically dumped the CAB onto the Smartphone's native storage memory, then the CAB had to temporarily extract to ADDITIONAL storage memory prior to installation on the miniSD....gobbling up all my free storage memory.

p.s....as you'll see in my prior post, I have plenty of native PROGRAM memory, little SYSTEM memory. Any way I can reallocate? The Pocket PC OS used to support this in user settings, but I think it's been removed/hidden

[Kris Kumar]

Any way I can reallocate? The Pocket PC OS used to support this in user settings, but I think it's been removed/hidden

Nope. :-( Windows Mobile Smartphones and the newer Pocket PC (5.0)don't support this anymore because they use flash based memory now.

BTW: Glad that you figured it out. I have run into the problem where the CAB doesnt have enough room in the main memory to run.

[ARW]

As I understand it you can specify storage card when installing this but it is then actually installed on the phone itself. Can anyone confirm what really happens.

Also, assuming I couldever free up enough room to install it, does the finished installation take up a full 6 plus mbs or is that just what is needed to install, extract etc?

TIA,

Al

[ARW]

Anybody have any real experience with this?

Here's a quote from .Net CF team's abstract.

"Installing NETCF V2 to storage card

While it is technically possible to redirect installation of NETCF onto storage card via standard Active Sync/WCELOD capabilities, it won’t save precious RAM on device. NETCF files have to be in \Windows folder in order for NETCF to function properly.

If NETCF is installed to storage card, NETCF files will be initially deployed to it. However, at some point they would moved to \Windows folder taking out exactly the same space as normal installation would.

In some cases attempt to use storage card would lead to installation failure due to some subtle storage card issues. Thus it’s not recommended to install NETCF V2 to storage card or embedded storage and there are no benefits of doing so."