SQL Server Compact 4.0 released!

WebMatrix has been released and will be launched at CodeMash on Thursday 13/1. Sign up for the live streaming event here. 

Download locations

At the same time, SQL Server Compact 4.0 (build 4.0.8482.1) has been  released to web, and is available via Web Platform Installer 3.0 and also available for download here:

Microsoft SQL Server Compact 4.0 (x86 and x64)

SQL Server Compact 4.0 Books Online

Visual Studio 2010 SP1 Tools for SQL Server Compact 4.0

(Team blog post about the VS 2010 SP1 tooling support)

Related blog posts

ScottGu has just issued a long blog post about using SQL Server Compact 4.0 with WebForms + Entity Framework Database First and MVC + Entity Framework Code First.

The SQL Compact team has a concise feature overview. And release announcement, which also includes information about scenarios not enabled with SQL Server Compact 4.0.

I have blogged about SQL Server Compact 4 at several occasions:

Getting started with SQL Server Compact 4.0 and ASP.NET 4.0 (no WebMatrix)

SQL Server Compact 4.0 news roundup

Downsize a SQL Server database to SQL Server Compact 4.0 (and 3.5)

SQL Server Compact version detector

SQL Server Compact 4.0 ASP.NET Membership provider

SQL Compact 4.0 now available as a .zip file

Using Entity Framework with SQL Server Compact 4.0 CTP and ASP.NET – tips & tricks (part one)

Entity Framework with SQL Server Compact 4.0 and ASP.NET – Dynamic Data, OData, deployment (part two)

Visual Studio Tools for SQL Server Compact 4 now available

SQL Server Compact “Private Deployment” on desktop–an overview

Comparison of SQL Server Compact 4 and SQL Server Express 2008 R2

Using SQL Server Compact 4.0 with WPF DataGrid, Entity Framework 4 and Private deployment (part 1)

Entity Framework with SQL Server Compact 4.0 and ASP.NET – Dynamic Data, OData, deployment (part two)

Using SQL Server Compact 4.0 with WPF DataGrid, Entity Framework 4 and Private deployment (part 1)

Using SQL Server Compact 4.0 with Desktop Private Deployment and a Setup project (MSI) (part 2)

Access SQL Server Compact 4 with ASP Classic and VbScript

Migrate a SQL Server Compact database to SQL Server using Web Deploy (MSdeploy)

Visual Studio 2010 Service Pack 1 with support for SQL Server Compact 4.0 released

Snapshot Synchronization with SQL Server Compact 4.0

Useful new topics in SQL Server Compact 4.0 Books Online

Saving images to SQL Server Compact with Entity Framework 4.1 Code First

Deployment improvements

The “Private” folder contains both the x64 and x86 related DLL files, and also contains the required C++ runtime DLL (new in RTM):

I will update my “Private Deployment” blog post with the new information.

No SQL Server Synchronization Supported

The SQL Server Compact 4.0 release does not support syncing of data with SQL Server using technologies like Microsoft Sync Framework, or merge replication, or remote data access (RDA).

Duplicate constraint names issue

The generation of the Entity Data Model for SQL Server Compact will fail if there are duplicate constraint names in the SQL Server Compact schema.

In SQL Server Compact, the constraint names are unique within a table and this can allow duplicate constraint names in the database. The behavior is different from SQL Server, where the constraint names are unique across the database. If a SQL Server Compact schema has duplicate referential integrity (primary key – foreign key relationship) constraint names, the generation of the Entity Data Model using the ADO.NET Entity Framework’s Entity Data Model Wizard will fail. The workaround is to change the name of the duplicate constraint name to be unique across the database, like by adding the name of the table to the constraint name.

I have worked around this limitation in my SQL Server Compact tools, SQL Server Compact Toolbox and SQL Server Compact Scripting Tools