In a packed hall of developers and industry partners at Microsoft Corp.’s annual Mobile & Embedded DevCon, the company announced the availability of a beta release of Windows® CE 6, the next generation of its industry-leading, real-time software used to build customized operating systems for devices such as Internet Protocol (IP) set-top-boxes, Global Positioning System (GPS)-based devices, and industrial automation and medical devices. With the redesigned operating system (OS) kernel architecture, expanded capacity for simultaneous processes and a newly integrated tool set, Windows CE 6 will help device makers more quickly create devices that support a range of applications for high-demand categories.
Windows CE 6 delivers an even more integrated embedded development environment that is now available via a plug-in for Visual Studio® 2005. Now developers have a single, familiar tool to help them quickly develop both operating systems and applications, helping enable them to improve time to market and reduce development costs. With Visual Studio 2005, Microsoft is opening the floodgates for over 7 million Visual Studio developers worldwide to use their existing tools and skills to create innovative, differentiated embedded devices.
The redesigned operating system kernel architecture supports significantly more simultaneously running processes, from 32 up to 32,000 simultaneous processes, each of which run in a 2GB virtual memory address space. This allows developers to incorporate larger numbers of more complex applications into more intelligent devices that offer advanced multimedia and Web services and wireless networking than before. Windows CE 6 provides continuity of features and functionality from previous generations of Windows CE, allowing device makers to utilize their previous investments in user interfaces, applications, middleware and drivers.
The beta release of Windows CE 6 is available to device makers, developers and partners at the Microsoft® Mobile & Embedded DevCon 2006. More information about Windows CE 6 can be found at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsce.
