Update for Japanese era for Windows Embedded Compact 7

This update provides the changes that are required for the new Japanese era for Windows Embedded Compact 7.

Japanese era range

On Windows Embedded Compact 7, the era range data is stored in the registry under the following subkey:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Nls\Calendars\Japanese\Eras

If it is necessary, additional eras can be added to this subkey, as follows:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Nls\Calendars\Japanese\Eras]

     "1868 01 01"="\\x660e\\x6cbb_\\x337e_Meiji_M"

     "1912 07 30"="\\x5927\\x6b63_\\x337d_Taisho_T"

     "1926 12 25"="\\x662d\\x548c_\\x337c_Showa_S"

     "1989 01 08"="\\x5e73\\x6210_\\x337b_Heisei_H"

     "2019 05 01"="\\x4ee4\\x548c_\\x32ff_Reiwa_R"

The name of each era value is the start date of the era in the Gregorian calendar. The value contains the era name in the Unicode value of the Japanese character, the abbreviated era name in the Unicode value of the Japanese character, the era name in English, and an abbreviated era name in English, as follows:

"YYYY MM DD"="\\xJE1\\xJE2_\\xAJE_EE_AEE"

The following definitions apply:

• "YYYY MM DD" is the Gregorian date of the start of the era in "four-digit year, two-digit month, two-digit day" format. A space separates each part of the date.

• "JE1" is the Unicode value of the first Japanese character of the name of the era.

• "JE2" is the Unicode value of the second Japanese character of the name of the era, followed by an underscore.

• "AJE" is the Unicode value of the Japanese abbreviated name of the era, followed by an underscore.

• "EE" is the English name of the Japanese era, followed by an underscore.

• "AEE" is the abbreviated English name of the Japanese era.
   

Gannen (元年) versus Ichinen (1年)

Windows Embedded Compact 7 supports both "Gannen" and "Ichinen" for the first year of the era. Gannen is enabled by default. However, it can be configured by using the following registry key.

Note "InitialEraYear" defines either Gannen or Ichinen.

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Control\Nls\Calendars\Japanese]

For Gannen:
"InitialEraYear"="\x5143\x5E74"

For Ichinen:
"InitialEraYear"="1\x5E74"
 

.NET Compact Framework 3.5 - Relaxed era range checks

A date in a particular era can “overflow” into the following era, and no ArgumentOutOfRangeException or FormatException is thrown by default. To restore strict era checks, set the following value to true or 1, as follows:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\.NETCompactFramework\AppContext

"Switch.System.Globalization.EnforceJapaneseEraYearRanges"="true"

"Switch.System.Globalization.EnforceJapaneseEraYearRanges"="1"
 

.NET Compact Framework 3.5 - The first year of an era (Gannen versus Ichinen)

By default, .NET adopts the Gannen (元年) convention in formatting operations for first year of an era. You can restore the previous behavior to represent the first year as “1” instead of as Gannen (元年). To do this, set the following values to true:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft.NETCompactFramework\AppContext

"Switch.System.Globalization.FormatJapaneseFirstYearAsANumber"="true"

"Switch.System.Globalization.EnforceLegacyJapaneseDateParsing"="true"

GetCalendarInfoEx API

GetCalendarInfoEx now supports an additional query to determine whether Gannen or Ichinen is in use.

A new value, CAL_SJAPANESEERAFIRSTYEAR, can be passed as a third parameter of GetCalendarInfoEx to retrieve the currently used first year of era convention.

However, Windows Embedded Compact 7 does not globally define CAL_SJAPANESEERAFIRSTYEAR in any header files in SDK. Therefore, applications must locally define CAL_SJAPANESEERAFIRSTYEAR as follows:

#define CAL_SJAPANESEERAFIRSTYEAR       0x0000003d 

CAL_SJAPANESEERAFIRSTYEAR is supported only on computers that have an update that support the new Japanese era installed. Computers without an update for the Japanese era will return 0 and ERROR_INVALID_FLAGS. In this case, the use of Ichinen is presumed.

The following Japanese language fonts in Windows Embedded Compact 7 includes support for new Japanese era character (U+32FF):

• Meiryo (Meiryo.ttc)

• Meiryo Bold (MeiryoB.ttc)

• MS Gothic (Msgothic.ttc)

• MS Mincho (MsMincho.ttc)

The following Japanese language reduced character set fonts in Windows Embedded Compact 7 don’t include support for the new Japanese Era character (U+32FF):

• Meiryo_4_50.ttf

• Meiryo_4_80.ttf

• Msgothic30.ttc

• Msgothic_1_50.ttc

• Msgothic_1_60.ttc

• Msgothic_1_70.ttc

• Msgothic_1_80.ttc

• Msgothic_1_90.ttc

• Msgothic30_1_19.ttc

• msg12and16.ttf

The following Japanese language compressed fonts in Windows Embedded Compact 7 don’t include support for the new Japanese era character (U+32FF):

• Meiryo_4_50.ac3

• Meiryo_4_80.ac3

• Msgothic.ac3

• Msgothic30.ac3

• Msgothic_1_50.ac3

• Msgothic_1_60.ac3

• Msgothic_1_70.ac3

• Msgothic_1_80.ac3

• Msgothic_1_90.ac3

• Msgothic30_1_19.ac3

• MsMincho.ac3

The Japanese calendar in Windows Embedded Compact 7 will continue to use the existing long, short, and month-year date formats. This differs from Windows desktop that may have updated date formats for the Japanese calendar.

Download information

The Windows Embedded Compact 7 Monthly Update (March 2019) is now available from Microsoft. To download the update, go to the Device Partner Center (DPC).

Prerequisites

This update is supported only if all previously issued updates for this product have also been installed.

Restart requirement

After you apply this update, you must perform a clean build of the whole platform. To do this, use one of the following methods:

• On the Build menu, click Clean Solution, and then click Build Solution.

• On the Build menu, click Rebuild Solution.

You do not have to restart the computer after you apply this software update.

Update replacement

This update does not replace any other updates.

The English version of this software update package has the file attributes (or later file attributes) that are listed in the following table. The dates and times for these files are listed in Coordinated Universal Time (UTC). When you view the file information, it is converted to local time. To find the difference between UTC and local time, use the Time Zone tab in the Date and Time item in Control Panel.

For more information about other Microsoft products for which the new Japanese era updates are being developed, see Updates for May 2019 Japanese era change.

Learn about the terminology that Microsoft uses to describe software updates.