The SQL Anywhere product is an entire suite of database applications and servers. It runs on many platforms, including Windows Mobile. Using Visual Studio, programmers can develop database applications that run on a Windows Mobile device.

One of the biggest problems I’ve run into when developing for mobile devices is data storage. Two problems come up. First, I’ll often be synchronizing with a server using a SQL database. Second, I’ll want to use relational databases in my mobile app itself while most devices today don’t natively support SQL. (The Android platform is an exception here. It includes SQLite.)

About a year ago, I started exploring Sybase’s SQL Anywhere product for another project that I was working on here at the office, and I was quite impressed. SQL Anywhere is actually a suite of tools, and included in it are several desktop versions, as well as a version that runs on Windows Mobile. Additionally, there’s the Ultralite edition, which runs on smaller Windows CE devices and Palm OS, and the Ultralite J edition—the J is for Java—which runs on BlackBerry and J2SE (Java 2 Platform Standard Edition).

What’s cool about the Windows Mobile edition is it allows developers to have full relational database access through SQL right on a mobile device running Windows Mobile. Users can store the tables right on the device, and later synchronize them with a server. For many of us, this is exactly what we need.

Sybase recently released version 11 of SQL Anywhere. For this article, I’m exploring the SQL Anywhere on a Windows Mobile 6 device (specifically an HTC/AT&T 8525 phone that has been upgraded to Windows Mobile 6).