NEWS
Visual Studio 2017 Version 15.6
Lots of exciting features being baked up in the latest Visual Studio Preview. Get it while it's hot!
Xamarin.Android Now Double Stuffed with Oreo 8.1
Android Oreo 8.1 introduces new features, including Android Go, Neural Networks API, Autofill framework enhancements, SharedMemory API, and lots of other stuff. Xamarin.Android has support for Android Oreo 8.1 in the latest release for both Visual Studio and Visual Studio for Mac.
CODE
X-Plat OpenID Connect client sample for iOS, Android, UWP
Jason DeBoever submits an interesting sample client application for OpenID Connect
Building A Generic SQLite Repository
Jesse Liberty talks about creating a generic repository for SQLite.
BUSINESS & MARKETING
‘AR as a feature’ is the best use of AR tech right now, and Amazon gets it
VR and AR are the new cool kids on the block. It's always interesting to see who is doing interesting things with it.
OPEN SOURCE
[POLL] What CustomRenderers Or Effects Do You Create In Xamarin.Forms?
Here is an interesting POLL created by Adam Pedley. This poll is here to see what are the most common types of platform specific code you write, in hopes it can be used as a todo list for the Xamarin.Forms team or community to complete.
When The App Was Built
How many times have you said "when was this app built" or "which version affects this bug"? Forget those, from now on just strongly shake your device and we'll show you when the app was built. That simple.
DEVOPS
Xamarin University Presents: Ship Better Apps with Visual Studio App Center
Join Mark Smith, Director of Xamarin University, on Thursday, January 25 at 9 am PT / 12 pm ET / 5 pm GMT to learn how to automate your app development pipeline with Visual Studio App Center.
TOOLS
ANDROID
Xamarin Android Tooltips
Xamarin.Android binding of android tooltips, a simple to use library for android, enabling to add a tooltip near any view with ease.
IOS
iOS EasyTipView
If you need tooltips in your iOS application then you're in luck, Nico Milcoff has written a neat little port of the swift EasyTipView over to C# and Xamarin.
XAMARIN FORMS
Mobile Apps on-boarding using Xamarin Forms and Lottie animations
Malcolm Jack shows howto create a neato app Onboarding flow with animations provided by Lottie.
Custom Fonts in Xamarin.Forms
Adam Pedley shows how to use 3rd party fonts into your Forms applications.
Delivering Rich Media Experiences with the Xamarin.Forms Video Player
Adam Fisher has created an awesome Video Player Component for Xamarin.Forms. In this Xamarin guest blog post he talks about how to get started using it.
Implement grouping in the Xamarin.Forms ListView
Gerald Versluis shows how to implement grouping in a Xamarin.Forms ListView
Consuming a RESTful Web Service in Xamarin Forms using Refit (Part 1)
Charlin Agramonte starts a series on how to use Refit to access your restful services. If you have not used Refit before, it's a great way to take out the boilerplate code of accessing web services
PODCASTS & VIDEOS
.NET Standard Libraries with Immo Landwerth
.NET Standard Libraries are the future! On the Xamarin Show James is joined byImmo Landwerth, who shows us how to start sharing code with .NET Standard 2.0 Libraries. He walks us through exactly what .NET Standard Libraries are, how they work, and how to get started with a lot of awesome tips and tricks along the way.
Merge Conflict 79: Frank Justifies His iMac Pro
Frank Krueger has taken the plunge on the new iMac Pro - good for him!
Gone Mobile 66: Under the Hood of the Azure Mobile App with Jakub Jedryszek
Jakub shares what he's learned using Xamarin to build the Azure App for iOS and Android. It's always interesting to see how real app developers are building real apps, the challenges they face, and tips and tricks for building our own apps.
Snack Pack 25: New .NET Standard Mobile App Templates in Visual Studio 2017
James does a quick survey of the new project templates inside of Visual Studio 2017