difference between WM & CE ?

[scavenger]

HI

what's the real difference between win CE 5.0 and WM x.x ?

is the first a light version of the other ?
are executables compatibles from an OS to the other ?

thanks

[josefcrist]

I want to know this to. are the differences in the shell only?

[scavenger]

as far as i know, i can install tomtom & stuff like that (designed for WM) on a winCE 5.0 . Sometimes it works, sometimes not.

That's why i need to know the main differences between

[jor3l]

hope this helps.. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Windows_CE

[scavenger]

where can we find USEFUL informations ?

as an example, is the autorun procedure the same for winCE & an SD card as for WM ? (ie using a directory called 2577)

[Da_G]

Take a look on MSDN, there is extensive documentation covering CE to be found there...

Here's a good place to start:

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms905511.aspx

The most major differences are the UI, and the underlying filesystem.

[poetryrocksalot]

Windows Mobile is based on Windows CE.

Windows CE is an OS whose purpose is to be very customizable for specific devices.

Therefore Windows Mobile is a customized version of Windows CE made specifically to work as a Pocket PC Smartphone OS.

Windows CE is the base operating system. It can be configured and bundled with programs to support different application areas. Windows Mobile is a configuration that supports smartphones and other mobile devices.

Windows Embedded CE is a customizable, embedded operating system for a variety of small-footprint devices. OEMs can use Windows Embedded CE to design platforms and customize applications to maximize the user experience for devices such as handhelds, thin clients, logic controllers, and advanced consumer electronics.

Windows Mobile is a complete software platform built on Windows Embedded CE. Unlike Windows Embedded CE, the Windows Mobile Smartphone and Pocket PC operating systems are specifically designed for devices that require a specialized hardware configuration. The software includes standardized interfaces and applications that ensure compatibility across hardware designs. For more information, visit the Windows Mobile Web site.

Windows Automotive is based on the Windows Embedded CE real-time embedded operating system. While it shares the rich platform and services of Windows Embedded CE, Windows Automotive enables features such as voice recognition technology, automotive power management, and other automotive-specific options.

Windows CE is an open, scalable, 32-bit, real-time operating system that can be embedded to build small footprint devices. With Windows CE one can develop robots, industrial controllers, gas station pumps, voting machines, kiosks, POS terminals, video games, medical equipment, digital music players, interactive televisions, Internet appliances, cameras, etc.

Windows CE includes a set of components. Like Lego for older geeks – each device can be built from different components, resulting in a completely unique device.

Most of the CE based devices also include a shell/user interface – but it's not a must, and it doesn’t need to have that Windows look and feel.

In order to create a standard platform for PDAs and cell phones, allowing a common user interface, a familiar experience, a common set of APIs and developer tools – Microsoft developed the Windows Mobile platform.

Windows Mobile is based on Windows CE, and different versions of it implement different CE features.

Now, here is the reason for the confusion: Windows Mobile holds 2 categories: Standard Edition and Professional Edition.

The Standard Edition is the simple version of Windows Mobile (that used to be called Smartphone), it doesn’t have a touch screen and its’ main role is to act as an advanced cellular phone with mail, web, and simple office capabilities.



The Professional Edition (used to be called Pocket PC) relates to more advanced PDAs that come with touch screen. Those devices hold an enhanced version of "pocket" Office, web browser, GPS navigators, and basically tons of available applications. To complete the mess, the professional edition also have a special category of devices with embedded phones, those devices run Windows Mobile Professional - Phone Edition.

Windows CE is more like a OS building kit than a specific operation system.

One important topic in that area is the so-called "kiosk mode". For example, you are writing a warehouse inventory system for mobile devices, and you don't want the users to be able to browse the web, play mp3s etc., just do their work. Provided the vendor has done his job proberly, devices based on WindowsCE can easily be locked down to disallow such activities; while devices based on WindowsMobile are actually hard to lock down.


http://lh6.ggpht.com/gil.bouhnick/SNl0EyGptqI/AAAAAAAABJU/EwDUnwnUQPA/s1600/image%5B12%5D.png

Sources:
http://stackoverflow.com/questions/881637/what-is-the-difference-between-windows-ce-and-windows-mobile
http://hubpages.com/hub/Do_you_know_the_difference_between_Windows_CE_and_ Windows_Mobile
http://mobilespoon.blogspot.com/2008/09/what-is-difference-between-windows-ce.html

[poetryrocksalot]

Double Post...

Edit: I thought the descriptions on wikipedia and microsoft's site is a bit uninformative or not very clear. I hope the post above helps (I was wondering the same thing about Windows CE too).

Also...check these out:
http://www.richterscale.org/pcgr/cassiopeia.jpg
http://www.larwe.com/technical/img/hpc_a_11a.jpg
http://www.pencomputing.com/images/cassiopeia_a20.jpg

http://castingoutnines.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/cassiopeia.jpg <- And this

They're handheld PC that uses Windows CE.

Nowadays you can carry and use Windows Vista in the palm of your hands with a UMPC!!!!

[Rudegar]

windows CE is out for a larger range of cpu models then windows mobile
where only arm is supported these days
binary exe files made for arm will only run on an arm cpu

so if a wm exe that don't have special ties to the shell will work out of the box
on any winCE which is based on arm cpu

and the other way around

[scavenger]

i see :) thanks a lot

so sometimes u can compile exe explicitely for arm, in the other hand you can compil exe with the system framework... which is cross plateform ?

hmmm i surely understand thant vendors can lock the system completely, with a software that prevent you from accessing to the desktop

so for my takara GPV1004 radio car, i can forget to hack it ?

[Rudegar]

"so sometimes u can compile exe explicitely for arm, in the other hand you can compil exe with the system framework... which is cross plateform ?"

yes and no windows mobile and windows CE applications are explicitely arm binary

when you say system framework it's microsoft .net compact framework it's cross platform but a subset of normal .net framework so not all windows .net apps would work well only few really
and the other way around if the compact framework use libs only for the pocketpc it would not run on a pc thinking gprs and gps spc apps here

also .net compact framework have worse performance as in not being as responsive compared to arm apps

[scavenger]

i just need to show the desktop of my radio car.

can i launch something via autorun from an SD card ? like a registry extractor of the "Lmachine/init" hive content ? then a registry injector to clean the "launch80" key ?

thanks

[Rudegar]

"can i launch something via autorun from an SD card ? like a registry extractor of the "Lmachine/init" hive content ? then a registry injector to clean the "launch80" key ?"

sure put a shortcut to it in the \windows\startup

[scavenger]

hmmmmmm it's a radio car, it doesn't have a slave usb port, it only have a cd/dvd slot, an USB slot, & 2 SD slots :(

how can i copy files to the FS of the flash rom ?

[scavenger]

i found myself a solution : http://www.hjgode.de/dev/imec/AutorunMechanics.htm

and for the autorun directory name here : http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms931644.aspx

thanks

[scavenger]

ok i found part of the solution :)

1) the autorun feature for SD cards is disabled, obviously

2) using the navigation software update in the settings menu, i forced it, after having replaced the igo.exe by regedit.exe, on the SD card : then when i launch the navigation i got REGEDIT in place :)

3) i tried the same with 2 different task killers, they don't show. I tried with Total Commander for WinCE but it doesn't show either. How come that Regedit does show and not the others ??

unfortunately any modification i made to the registry under the Lmachine\init keys are replaced at reboot !

there is obviously an antorun feature at reboot, that imports essential registry keys.

--> Can anyone tell me how to disable it ? Or tell me how to kill the main.exe app using an executable, knowing it must be launched without parameters ? I tried Mortscripts but it need a script as parameter

[wovens]

You said you can use TotalCommander. It works in other WM. Try renaming main.exe to something like mainbak.exe, then copy something you want to start but rename the application main.exe. Don't know if you have a lot of memory left but you could try. I suppose it would not damage anything...just a thought!

[scavenger]

thanks for the advice but ...

the car radio start by launching main.exe
replacing igo.exe when flashing, i can launch only regedit this way, so far.
i can't rename nor move main.exe since it's always in memory

main.exe is the GUI of this car radio, it permit to launch several applications as radio, dvd, navigation & so. It's called by the Lmachine\init\launch70 key & can't be modified since the registry is reloaded each reboot.

u see the problem ?
the only solution i thought is to find a way to compile an exe that will kill "main.exe" at launch, with no parameters.

[mrcrassic]

Windows Mobile CE is an embedded operating system that's designed for a variety of low-powered computers and electronics. It can be tailored to work as the designer requires, and extend the functionality of any device that uses it. Some people know of it from using older PDAs before Windows Mobile was developed, but it's also used in ATMs, automotive systems, robots and more.

Windows Mobile is a subset of Windows CE that's tailored specifically for PDAs and mobile devices. Originally, its codebase was meant to be used only with PDA-phones (i.e. PDAs that just so happened to have telephony capabilities, which were usually pretty poor), but this changed with the release of Windows Mobile for Smartphones (which has now sort-of reunified as Windows Mobile).

I don't know how much could really be done with vanilla Windows CE, and most of us know how to work with Windows Mobile ROMs.