Windows Embedded Compact 7 Evaluation Download
Cross posted from Brian Rogers: Removing complexity slowly.
Hey everyone, it is with great joy that I tell you Windows Embedded Compact 7 has been released. It has been well over 8 months since I last posted about the product's status. I am happy to do so now and hope that you test the download and installation experiences. Your feedback will help us improve the product experience.
Here are a couple ways you could help me out.
Our installer, the engine, writes all the logs to the user’s profile temporary directory. Typically this would be the environment variable %temp%. In the instance of WindowsEmbeddedCompact7.exe and WindowsEmbeddedSilverlightTools.exe, we create log files which remove the .exe and add .nnnn.log. So the full string would look something like WindowsEmbeddedCompact7.0001.log.
If you are familiar with Windows API calls and error codes, you should be able to scan the logs and find errors and issues that will help you address the problem you are seeing. If you aren’t familiar with the above, please feel free contact me through this blog by sending me a direct email and I will try to help you directly.
One item I've already found involves the physical product discs. In Compact 7 we introduced a new feature called the Windows Embedded Developer Update. The developer update functionality is installed as a Visual Studio add-in during the Compact 7 installation. We have noticed an irregular occurrence that, after the Compact 7 installation has completed and within the same user session (i.e., the user hasn't logged off or rebooted since completing the install) when starting Visual Studio, users may see a Windows dialog saying, “There is no disk in drive. Please insert a disk into drive D.” This occurs when the Windows Embedded Developer Update checks for an update on-line. So far, we've only been able to reproduce this when the user has removed the disc from the drive and hasn't yet rebooted or logged off after completing the install.
The root issue is straightforward. Windows is simply looking for a disk to be in your CD/DVD drive. This prompt can be dismissed by placing any disc in the drive. It does not need to be the Compact 7 installer disc. We're fixing this right now so that the operating system won't look for a disc in the drive when starting the Windows Embedded Developer Update. We are running the fix through an extended test cycle. If you experience this, please do write me (via this blog) so I can learn more about how it occurred on your system and provide assistance as needed.
Here are three simple workarounds: Either click the continue button 41 times (once for each MSI in Compact 7) or put any disc at all into your disc drive or log off and then log back into the user account. Any of these will dismiss the message and allow for the Windows Embedded Developer Update to continue checking online for new updates.
I will update this post as soon as we release this fix to the field. Your comments and feedback are most welcome.