Customer Reviews

Building Powerful Platforms with Windows CE®

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

This book was written in 2001 (as were most of the positive reviews for it here on Amazon.) It only covers up to Platform Builder and WinCE 3.0, which are now up to version 5. As a result, the how-to parts, as well as the references, are mostly useless. In fact, I'm not sure any of the sections are relevant or can be trusted since WinCE has changed so much.

Considering the price of the book, I feel cheated. The authors need to write a new version and THIS version should be pulled from circulation.

You need this book if you are using Platform Builder 3.0 to build/create Windows CE 3.0 image on customs platform; this book is very up to date with regards to Platform Builder; I used "Windows CE From the Ground Up book before"; that book is good but it is outdated and refer to older version of Platform Builder. This book covers the material better than a course I took on Platform Builder; 2 things help in my project: 1. This book and Windows CE From The Ground Up book. 2. Intel StrongArm Dev. Kit for Windows CE; you can get a CDROM(free) from Intel with CE 3.0 drivers(in source forms).

By reading this book and poking into Intel stuffs you can go a long way in understanding Windows CE.

Book is out of date and is exteremly overpriced. Anyone who attends a DevConference receives more information that is upto date than what was covered in the entire book. Waste of time and money.

Building Powerful Platforms with Windows CE is a very technical book, which is the whole point. Yet the authors take the time not only to define significant terms, but also to explain the reasoning and philosophy behind an element. The book is written expecting a base level of computer science knowledge, but beyond that it builds the reader up on CE-specific science, from memory management, power management, registry, major libraries, through development tools, CE project management, and even "is CE the right choice for you".

If you're already a bright software/hardware developer, but lack CE expertise, this is your book.

As is common practice, material is broken into illustrations, tables, sidebars, notes, and so on. This book in particular uses that technique not simply out of necessity, but to make the subject more readable and usable. This careful organization of information is really appreciated. For example, when a CE feature is not applicable or differs in function between Windows CE 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0, a version information note is broken out to call attention to the differences. (Gratefully, the authors are careful to balance the number of side comments; other books tend to overuse those elements to the detriment of the primary text.)

Figures are drawn to demonstrate power management states, directory structures, boot process, and so on; this isn't a book just of screen shots. And again with source code, short examples are sprinkled throughout the book, not used as filler.

One of the things I look for when flipping through a technical book from a store shelf is a sense for the amount of meat. That way, even if not every chapter is immediately applicable to my particular needs, there's still a lot of material that is valuable. This book is striking in that regard for the concentration and depth of high-quality, reliable technical information.

You needn't dust off a prominent place on your bookshelf for this book, as it will spend most of the time open on your desk.

Unlike all other WinCE books currently on the market this book covers the topic of creating a custom platform.

It is filled with interesting diagrams, tables an overviews and gives an in dept explanation on how to write a device driver.

The book also contains a detailed description of the WinCE build process behind the IDE tools, which is very useful when you start experimenting with different OS configurations.

It's a must when you are planning to work with Platformbuilder

We are using CE 3.0 to develop new instrument; this book helps in undertanding Platform Builder 3.0 and also the components that make Windows CE 3.0; the "Windows CE From The Ground Up" book is also helpful but it is outdated and I got that book as I was waiting for this book to come out.

A course($2000 course) I took in Platform Builder 3.0 is useless; in my situation, 3 things that help me understand Windows CE are: 1. Windows CE From the Ground Up book; it is outdated and refers to Windows 2.11/2.12; it stills has some relevant material. 2. Building Powerful Platforms book; very relevant content and answer some lingering questions. 3. StrongArm Dev. Kit CDROM from Intel(free from Intel); contains driver source codes to build Windows CE on Intel Dev. Kit(StrongArm reference design).

The Platform Builder 3.0 documentation and some experimentation provide the necessary details but this book provides invaluable guides.

Sure this book is a tad outdated, but there aren't many books that address this topic. I have not read Boling's book, but browsed a copy and I think it does not address the low level programming to the extent that this book does. You won't find a better book on the development of the actual platform than this one. This covers drivers, OAL, bootloaders, hardware accessing, and also generally how a CE project could be planned by management right down to developers. I would not want to work on a CE platform without this book. Anything outdated about this book, can be supplemented by reading MSDN documentation. But this book gives you a starting point and a great high level explanation of the system as a whole, which is something that is hard to get out of reading tons of MSDN documentation if don't already have a lot of experience in a topic.

For developers interested in a CE project, this is a must-have. It covers the gamut of project planning and boot/system/application work for custom and supported hardware. There is a detailed chapter on the boot loader, extensive coverage of device driver architecture and implementation, and a sample projects with build options, registry settings, etc. Very useful book.

Building powerful platforms... is the only book in the market I've found that covers everything you need to know about creating custom platforms for Windows CE. The authors do an excellent job of integrating tutorials with in-depth information about the architecture and operation of CE

A good overview...lots of useful information. Just be aware that this was written for CE 3.0, and 5.0 is current, with 6.0 in Beta, so there are detail differences. Still, a good starting point, and I can't find any more current books on the subject. So if you need to learn to use the Microsoft Platform Builder to do Windows CE embedded sysgens, this is the only game in town.