SQL Server Compact with Visual Studio 2008

Question

I am running SQL server 2008 and Visual Studio 2008 on Vista. I downloaded SQL server compact 3.5 SP1 from Microsofts website and ran the install. When I open the server explorer for any windows application that I'm working on with VS 2008 and right click on data connections and then on add a connection a dialog comes up with available data providers. The problem is that SQL compact is not one of the options. Any idea why SQL compact is not showing up as a data provider in VS 2008?

Answer 1

This is quoted form here: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa983340.aspx

1. On the Project menu, click Add Existing Item.

2. In the Add Existing Item dialog box, browse to the location of the Northwind.sdf file, and then click Add.

3. Expand the Tables node and check the Customers table.

4. Click Finish and the database (Northwind.sdf) file is added to the project, together with a typed dataset (NorthwindDataset).

Note: In the Add Existing Item dialog box, you have to click Data Files in the Objects of type list to make the .sdf file visible. After you add the database file, the Data Source Configuration Wizard opens to the Choose Your Database Objects page.

P.D. What installer did you run? Check this: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa983341.aspx

Answer 2

Did you try "Local database" option?

Answer 3

Looks like it was an install problem on Vista for me when I had a similar problem. Solved it by manually installing the Design Tools as mentioned here:

http://www.tech-archive.net/pdf/Archive/SQL-Server/microsoft.public.sqlserver.ce/2008-09/msg00070.pdf