Forgive the potentially stupid question... I'm starting all this (mobile development) relatively fresh and want to use these Mobile application blocks. Specifically, the Disconnected Services Agent.  Unfortunately I note that it would seem the DSA 'quick start' is still in process (no friendly Word Doc or pdf like the other quick starts). Where I'm stuck is that all of the documentation I have found so far (including the book "Microsoft Mobile Development Handbook by Wigley,Moth and Foot") indicate that I need to apply recipes from the Mobile Client Software Factory guidance package. 

I saw this in action during a failed detour through SCSF (the Smart Client factory is overkill -- IMO-- for what I want to do) but I can't get it to fly with the new Mobile App Blocks for VS 2008 here.

I went so far as to attempt to install the July 2006 MCSF framework and follow the various articles on forcing it to work with vs 2008 (my thinking was that I perhaps needed the original factory install to get the GP).

Anyway, enough rambling...  Can anyone point me in the right direction here.  If I've made no sense with my query (not surprising) please feel free to ask me for clarifications!

Thanks in advance!

Well, this Community Release of the Mobile Application Blocks are not "Software Factory" oriented. What we're looking for is to provide a simpler adoption path without major requirements like GAT and GAX would be.

That's the reason why you won't find a Guidance Package as part of the Blocks. We're just providing the blocks source code, so you can use what you need without passing thru a complex setup. You can actually just pull one block and use it on your project.

However, your concern definitely makes sense, as the former MCSF includes a DSA wizard that makes easier to setup a new DSA based on a Web Reference for C# projects (not for VB.Net).

About that wizard, I was working on a port of that code to the current version of GAT/GAX and VS2008, and I will publish it very soon in the Mobile Contrib project as a community contribution, so if you want to use it on VS 2008, you will be able to do it.

Also, we are working on a Reference Implementation (which is pretty much done), that includes a manual implementation of a DSA. Andy Wigley is building (if it's not already done) a QuickStart with another manual implementation of a DSA and, additionally, we'll be publishing a screencast around DSA showing how to build it from scratch without using the wizard in a few weeks.

So, feel free to let us know if you can see another topic where guidance is needed, your feedback is very important to us, it helps to make the blocks better.

Thanks!