PDC 2009 Day 3: New Developer Tools in Windows Embedded Standard 2011

Existing Windows Embedded offerings: Windows Embedded Compact runs on consumer devices such as GPS, Windows Embedded Standard runs on microscopes, projectors, and Windows Embedded POSReady runs on point-of-sale devices.

Windows Embedded Standard 2011 is a way to build devices with a custom Windows 7-based OS, with only the features you need. It supports standard Windows applications, 64-bit and 32-bit drivers, Windows servicing tools, and additional features.

The Developer Toolkit has a Wizard experience – Image Build Wizard, installs a Standard 2011 image on the device interactively, suitable for prototyping and evaluation. The Advanced Experience (Image Configuration Editor with a Target Analyzer) provides more advanced OS settings. Tools such as WinPE, WDS etc. are also supported.

Building blocks: Embedded core (bootable, command line, networking features), Feature Packages (e.g. IE, .NET, DirectX), Language Packs, Driver Packs, Embedding Enabled Features, and of course any third party software. This all goes through the Image Builder Engine and results in the embedded OS.

The IBW (wizard) operates from a template or an empty starting point. The templates can contain all wizard element described in the previous paragraph. There’s also some smart dependency analysis in the wizard so that you don’t exclude packages or features required for proper operation of the device.

The advanced editor (ICE) allows changing the machine settings (e.g. firewall rules) as well as scripting installations of other applications with answer files to all questions asked by installers (including product license keys), the Windows welcome screen etc. (these are just smart macros ;-)).

[The rest of the session was basically one big demo of ICW and ICE and how they can be used to configure an image for prototyping, deployment, installation, etc.]