MS SQL Server CE

• Sep 24, 2025
• 4 minutes to read

The Dashboard Designer allows you to connect to different types of SQL databases in the Data Source Wizard. You can also use data access API to connect to the database and select data in code.

This tutorial describes how to establish a connection to a Microsoft SQL Server CE database and select data.

• Create a Data Source in the Data Source Wizard
• Create a Data Source in Code

Important

The appropriate data provider must be installed on the client machine. For information on data providers, refer to the Data Sources article.

Create a Data Source in the Data Source Wizard

To connect to the MS SQL Server CE database in the Dashboard Designer, do the following:

1. Click the New Data Source button in the Data Source ribbon tab.

2. On the first page of the invoked Data Source Wizard dialog, specify whether you want to use an existing data connection or create a new data connection.

3. On the next page, select Microsoft SQL Server CE and click Next.

4. On the next page, specify connection parameters.

5. After you specify connection parameters, click Next and specify how to select data from the database.

6. On the final page, you can optionally add query parameters and preview data.

Create a Data Source in Code

To create a data source that uses a connection to the MS SQL Server CE database, create an instance of the DashboardSqlDataSource class and follow the steps below:

1. Specify connection parameters for the MS SQL Server CE database. Create the MsSqlCEConnectionParameters class object and specify the following properties:

2. Create one of the following objects to specify the query:

3. Add the created DashboardSqlDataSource object to the Dashboard.DataSources collection.

The following code snippet shows how to supply the dashboard with data from the MS SQL Server CE Northwind database:

• C#
• VB.NET

using DevExpress.DashboardCommon;
using DevExpress.DataAccess.ConnectionParameters;
using DevExpress.DataAccess.Sql;
// ...
            MsSqlCEConnectionParameters mssqlCEParams = new MsSqlCEConnectionParameters();
            mssqlCEParams.FileName = @"..\..\Data\Northwind.sdf";
            mssqlCEParams.Password = "password";

            DashboardSqlDataSource sqlDataSource = new DashboardSqlDataSource("Data Source 1", mssqlCEParams);
            SelectQuery selectQuery = SelectQueryFluentBuilder
                .AddTable("SalesPerson")
                .SelectColumns("CategoryName", "Extended Price")
                .Build("Query 1");
            sqlDataSource.Queries.Add(selectQuery);
            sqlDataSource.Fill();
            dashboard.DataSources.Add(sqlDataSource);

Imports DevExpress.DashboardCommon
Imports DevExpress.DataAccess.ConnectionParameters
Imports DevExpress.DataAccess.Sql
' ...
            Dim mssqlCEParams As New MsSqlCEConnectionParameters()
            mssqlCEParams.FileName = "..\..\Data\Northwind.sdf"
            mssqlCEParams.Password = "password"

            Dim sqlDataSource As New DashboardSqlDataSource("Data Source 1", mssqlCEParams)
            Dim query As SelectQuery = SelectQueryFluentBuilder _ 
                .AddTable("SalesPerson") _ 
                .SelectColumns("CategoryName", "Extended Price") _
                .Build("Query 1")
            sqlDataSource.Queries.Add(selectQuery)
            sqlDataSource.Fill()
            dashboard.DataSources.Add(sqlDataSource)