VS 2005 and Windows CE 5.0 - Where's my emulator ?

After posting two Visual Studio 2005 tutorial videos I've received a couple of questions about the Windows CE Emulator - eMbedded Visual C++ 4.0 and Visual Studio 2003 both shipped with a Windows CE Emulator based on a configuration of Windows CE that was somewhat close to the Internet Appliance operating system configuration, this was a good starting point to test out simple applications, the problem with the emulator that ships with eVC and VS2003 is that it doesn't expose any of the functionality of "your" platform.

Visual Studio 2005 doesn't ship with a "Windows CE 5.0" Emulator but does ship with an ARM based emulator for Pocket PC/Smartphone (now collectively called "Windows Mobile") - The Windows Mobile devices run with a fixed operating system image, meaning that you know what components or technologies are on my Pocket PC, your Pocket PC and everyone elses Pocket PC (or Smartphone) - Windows CE 5.0 isn't quite as simple, you have the flexibility of building the operating system image containing the components and technologies that you want/need for your device. Based on this, I rarely used the "Standard SDK" Emualor from eMbedded Visual C++ or Visual Studio, instead I would target a running Platform Builder emulator image - for eMbedded Visual C++ I would typically used the CESH/KITL connection to piggy-back on the existing Platform Builder connection - for Visual Studio 2003 I would need the Smart Device Authentication Utilities.

For Visual Studio 2005 I can use the existing "Windows CE 5.0 Device" target (I don't need to build an SDK from Platform Builder), once I've booted my Windows CE 5.0/Platform Builder Emulator Image, I need to get the IP Address of the emulator (use Virtual Switch in Platform Builder to make sure you can ping the Emulator!) and then I can use the same ClientSide2 and CMAccept utilities as shown in the tutorial videos to target the running Windows CE/Platform Builder emulator.

- Mike