The Windows XP Embedded Command-Line Tool
Improving the developer experience through a command line tool to script XP Embedded builds, edit configurations, and mine the database
by Matt Kellner
In 2002, Windows XP Embedded Service Pack 1 shipped a command-line tool called CMI Explorer. This tool was a simple value-add script that provided some of the functionality also available in Target Designer and Component Database Manager. The original version of this tool was challenging to use and poorly documented; and it didn't provide a lot of value to our customers. Overall, our customers challenged us to update the tool to better automate their build processes and perform various tasks with it. This interest in a command-line tool (and particularly scripting capability) remained high.
When I took over development of CMI Explorer in January 2006, I set out to understand the most common customer scenarios and requests for our tools. The most common request was, by far, a way to automate Target Designer; particularly to be able to make small changes to a configuration and build it without having to manually work with the graphical user interface (GUI) every time. Other customers wanted a way to efficiently import their custom components without having to use Component Database Manager, and many requested the ability to trace component dependency relationships (something none of our existing tools provided directly).
After several months of research and development, we released a new version of this tool, simply called "Windows XP Embedded Command-Line Tool," or XPECMD for short. XPECMD enables many developer scenarios and can greatly improve a developer's productivity -- among its top features:
- A powerful command-line interface to modify and build configurations
- Easy-to-use Single-Quote Expression (SQE) engine makes it simple to look up components by name, Globally Unique Identifier (GUID) or revision.
- Reduction in overall development time by simplifying the developer experience
- Script through the use of flexible "response files," which can be created manually or on the fly by automation
- Interface to research component dependency relationships
- Import into and administer component databases
Here's an example of what you can do with XPECMD: A common task in Target Designer is to open an existing configuration; add or change a component; resolve dependencies; then build the resulting runtime image. In TD, this process can be somewhat slow and cumbersome, and there's really no way to automate it. If you need to perform the same task across multiple configuration files, dealing with the GUI can become a serious burden.
In XPECMD, however, you need just a few commands to perform the same task. For example, say you want to add a new User Account to your configuration. You can leverage XPECMD's powerful Single-Quote Expression (SQE) syntax to add a new component instance to your configuration, and the whole process can be done in just a few easy steps:
xpecmd> dbo MYSERVER
xpecmd> load myConfig "c:\myImages\myConfig.slx"
xpecmd> new myInst = 'inst:^User Account'
xpecmd> add myConfig myInst
xpecmd> myInst.Properties("cmiUserName") = "Matt"
xpecmd> myInst.Properties("cmiPassword") = "SomePassword"
xpecmd> myInst.Properties("cmiUserGroup") = 0
xpecmd> myConfig.ResolveDependencies 2
xpecmd> save myConfig "c:\myConfigs\myConfig.slx"
xpecmd> Build myConfig "c:\myImages\myImage1" |
This code can run in as little as 10-15 seconds, depending on the complexity of your runtime. To make it even more convenient, you can write this into a response file and set it up so it can take parameters for the config and runtime image paths. Then you can easily automate the process across multiple files,
running them all as a batch in a fraction of the time it would take to do all this in TD.
Another useful feature of XPECMD is the ability to trace component dependencies both directions. Using the DEPTREE and SHOW commands, you can easily see a component's dependencies - DEPTREE also allows you to see an entire tree of component dependencies if you so desire. Meanwhile, the DEPTRACE command allows you to see which components depend on a specific component. As an example, let's look at the forward and reverse dependencies of Enhanced Write Filter:
xpecmd> new c = 'comp:Enhanced Write Filter'
xpecmd> show c.Dependencies
Dependencies: [14 items]
----- ------------
Index: Value
----- ------------
12: Dependency on "Disk Management Basic Volume Runtime" caused by "FTDISK.SYS"
11: Dependency on "Microsoft Visual C++ Run Time" caused by "MSVCRT.DLL"
13: Dependency on "PnP (User-mode)" caused by "CERTCLAS.INF"
14: Dependency on "Primitive: Umpnpmgr" caused by "UMPNPMGR.DLL"
2: Enhanced Write Filter build before Class Installer - Storage volumes
1: Enhanced Write Filter build before Volume Shadow Copy Service
9: Enhanced Write Filter depends on Class Installer - Storage volumes
10: Enhanced Write Filter depends on EWF NTLDR
3: Enhanced Write Filter depends on Loader
4: Primitive: Ntdll
5: Primitive: Setupapi
6: Win32 API - Advanced
7: Win32 API - Kernel
8: Win32 API - User
xpecmd> deptrace revdeps c
Analyzing Database... 100%
Components: [2 items]
----- ------------
Index: Value
----- ------------
2: El Torito CD [R2890]
1: Enhanced Write Filter API (EWF API) [R2890] |
XPECMD has many other ways to improve your productivity, but as I showed in the few examples above, this utility should enable XP Embedded developers to be more productive, more easily search for information in their configurations or in the database, and finally, incorporate the XPe build process into existing build environments. Be sure to check out the new tool (included in the Tools Update of Feature Pack 2007 CTP) and the "How To" document available on the
Microsoft Connect site.
You can find more information about the Windows XPe product at its
homepage on MSDN. You can also download a Community Technology Preview version of FP 2007 from the
Microsoft Connect Site -- sign up for the CTP using this Invitation ID: 123-BC7M-6GVK.
Copyright (c) 2006 Microsoft Corp. All rights reserved. Reproduced by WindowsForDevices.com with permission.
About the author: Matt Kellner is a test engineer on the Windows Embedded team who describes himself as a "jack-of-all-trades," providing various testing services and developing tools for several different groups within the team. Matt has been using and programming computers since he was a kid and says he is "passionate about the quality of my work."
Read the Complete XPe SP2 FP2007 Whitepaper Series
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