SQL Server Compact 3.5 - Cross Version Comptibility

There has been quite a lot of discussion on the SQL Server Compact Edition MSDN Forum since SQL Server Compact Edition 3.5 was released and most of it has been around it's compatibility (or lack of) with SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server 2008. The good news is that the SQL Server Compact Team have released a great post on their blog about "Connectivity cross version compatibility scenarios for the SQL Server Compact 3.5 release" which should help alleviate some of the misconceptions about the product.

Summary:

1. SQL Server Compact 3.5 can synchronize with only SQL Server 2005 not with SQL Server 2000.
2. SQL Server Compact 3.5 Server Tools enables synchronization between SQL Server Compact client versions 3.0, 3.1, and 3.5 and SQL Server 2005 through SQL Server Compact3.5 IIS components.
3. SQL Server Compact 3.5 SP1 can synchronize with both SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server 2008.
4. SQL Server Compact 3.5 SP1 Server Tools package enables synchronization between SQL Server Compact client versions 3.0, 3.1, 3.5 and SQL Server 2008 through SQL Server Compact 3.5 SP1 IIS components.

Some of you may have notice that they talk about SP1 versions of SQL Server Compact 3.5 and SQL Server Compact 3.5 Server Tools. Here is a release plan for these packages (no dates provided):

1. Phase1: Release SQL Server Compact 3.5 Server Tools package for SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server Compact 3.5 SP1 Beta Server Tools package for SQL Server 2008.
2. Phase2: Release the SQL Server Compact 3.5 SP1 Server Tools package for both SQL Server 2005 and SQL Server 2008. This new package will replace the Phase 1 packages.

The original post also provides a fair bit of detail on various Deployment Scenarios for SQL Server 2000/2005/2008 and SQL Server Compact Edition 2.0/3.0/3.1/3.5 . It doesn't however cover any of the following deployment scenarios:

1. Upgrading clients from SQL Server Compact version 2.0 to versions 3.0 and 3.1
2. Upgrading from SQL Server 2000 to SQL Server 2005
3. Mixed installations including SQL Server compact client versions 2.0, 3.0, 3.1 and SQL Server or publisher versions SQL Server 2000 (8.0), and SQL Server 2005 (9.0)

For more information about these deployment scenarios, please see SQL Server Compact 3.1 Connectivity Tools documentation.

Cross Version Compatibility Support Matrix

The following tables provides the cross version compatibility support for each different type of deployment scenario. The table includes:

• “Dx”: An identifier for each different scenario.
• “Existing Support”: A deployment that is already supported. For more information, see SQL Server Compact 3.1 Connectivity Tools.
• “New Support”: A new supported deployment. This new deployment is explained in this blog post later.
• “Pending Support”: Specifies that SQL Server Compact 3.5 RTM does not support synchronization to SQL Server 2008 but this support will be enabled in SQL Server Compact 3.5 SP1.

The following table summarizes the compatibility with SQL Server Compact, SQL Server and server IIS components. For more information, see Section 2 Deployment Scenarios. This section requires thorough understanding of Merge Replication deployment.

The full post can be found here.