Data transfer to portable.

[Tull Clancey]

Hi all.

I'm nearing completion of a host app that needs to send data to, and receive
data back from a portable, an HP device. The application running on the
portable will be a .net application.

Basically I need to know the best practice, or most reliable way of sending
and receiving data on a serial connection.

In VB6/EVB I used to use the RAPI commands for sending data, until the 2003
portable OS came out which didn't allow the portable to clear a database.

Do I need to send a text file and parse this into a database created on the
portable? Or can I send a database, or sub set?

Synching the data is not practical for this application, I will want to
overwrite all the data on the portable with every download, and retrieve a
single table from the portable on an upload.

Any ideas?

Cheers,
Tull.

[Moshazu]

Check out www.opennetcf.org

It is a .net class library that allows you to do pretty much anything
dealing with portable devices.

[Dick Grier]

Hi,

I'm nearing completion of a host app that needs to send data to, and receive
data back from a portable, an HP device. The application running on the
portable will be a .net application.

Basically I need to know the best practice, or most reliable way of sending
and receiving data on a serial connection.
<<

I suppose the most reliable way is to use an error-checked file transfer
protocol, such as XMODEM/CRC. Why do you choose serial instead of a network
connection, though? Or, are you saying that you use a serial ActiveSync
connection (since you mention RAPI)? This really isn't serial, except as a
physical connection. Rather, it tunnels TCP/IP through AS.
In VB6/EVB I used to use the RAPI commands for sending data, until the 2003
portable OS came out which didn't allow the portable to clear a database.
<<

I haven't heard of such a problem. Can you elaborate?

Do I need to send a text file and parse this into a database created on the
portable? Or can I send a database, or sub set?

Synching the data is not practical for this application, I will want to
overwrite all the data on the portable with every download, and retrieve a
single table from the portable on an upload.

SQL CE is the easiest, I think. There are other possibilities, such as the
adapters from OpenNETCF (www.opennetcf.org).

Your best bet is to ask specific questions about this sort of thing in
microsoft.public.dotnet.framework.compactframework .

Dick

--
Richard Grier (Microsoft Visual Basic MVP)

See www.hardandsoftware.net for contact information.

Author of Visual Basic Programmer's Guide to Serial Communications, 4th
Edition ISBN 1-890422-28-2 (391 pages) published July 2004. See
www.mabry.com/vbpgser4 to order.