Getting started with SQL Server Data Services (SSDS)

I spent this weekend primarily doing two things:

1) hacking away at my new HTC Kaiser (AT&T Tilt, TyTn II), unlocking it, flashing new ROMs, installing new CABs, and
2) getting familiar with the basics of using SSDS.

The David Robinson MSDN Magazine article that helped kickstart me on this topic can be found here. Even better, it turns out there's an invaluable SDK/toolkit for getting to know SSDS -- the SQL Server Data Services SDK (beta) of course. There is also a single MSDN forum dedicated to SSDS. I haven't yet discovered an IRC channel. There are a number of MSDN team blogs, as well as a handful of non-MS blogs that I'll cover in later posts.

To up the ante a bit, I decided to write a console (command line) app for my Windows Mobile 6.1 device, the HTC Kaiser. I was halfway through implementing this app when I discovered the SDK, and the command line tool that comes with it. I'm going to reimplement this tool, ST.exe, for Windows Mobile/.NET CompactFramework 3.5. (I've tried to find source for it, so far, no go ...)

The SDK also comes with a GUI explorer that makes it simple to understand the RESTful operations supported by Authorities, Containers and/or Entities. (You can't PUT, or update, Authorities or Containers. Yet attempts to do so still seem to increment those objects' version numbers ...)

So far, I'm liking the SSDS beta experience. More to follow.

I need a new Windows Mobile phone

My three?! year old Cingular 8125/HTC Wizard seems to be on its last legs -- hardware issues, no amount of re-ROMming makes it better.

I want another Windows Mobile phone I can hack away at and run my own .NET code on -- this is as much a learning and demonstration tool as anything else. Heck, I hardly ever use any minutes on my phone, but that's beside the point ...

The TyTn II is nice, but a little bit more than I'd like to spend right now. And I'm not sure I trust HTC hardware, especially with the TyTn's missing driver issue. The Samsung Blackjack II was recommended to me by Kris over at Smartphonethoughts.com ... it seems like a solid candidate. $300 or so retail, WM6, GPS ...



Thoughts, other suggestions, welcome! Thanks in advance!