Issue 97

NEWS

Recap of dotnetConf 2016

dotNetConf 2016 is over, and it was the biggest and best yet! It ran for three full days and offered some amazing content for Xamarin / .NET developers. All of the videos are available right now on Channel9.

ASP.NET Core 1.0 RC2 support in Xamarin Studio

Xamarin Studio and MonoDevelop now have support for ASP.NET Core 1.0 RC2 via an add-in that's now available from the alpha channel repository.

NuGet improvements in Xamarin Studio 6.0

This release resolves some long-standing annoyances and issues such making it possible to update an later pre-release NuGet package from the Solution window. Unfortunately, we have to wait until Xamarin Studio 6.1 drops before package maintainers can switch over to using netstandard.

Xamarin Studio 6.1 preview available

I CANNOT WAIT for this to stabilise as NuGet v3 / netstandard makes the life of library maintainers so much better in so many ways.

What exactly is netstandard?

CODE

Password-protected encryption provider for Akavache

Akavache stores data in so-called blob caches. By default, data stored in encrypted blob caches is not encrypted on Xamarin platforms. In this post, Kent Boogaard details how to enable encryption.

DESIGN

User Errors

‘Errors’ happen. They occur in our apps, and they happen in our life. Sometimes they happen because we made mistakes. Sometimes because a system failed. Whatever the cause, these errors and how they are handled can have an enormous impact on the way the user experiences your app. Often overlooked, careless error handling and ill-constructed error messages can fill users with frustration, and make them stop using your app. A well-crafted error handling flow, on the other hand, can turn a moment of failure into a time of delight.

ANDROID

SQLite and Android N

The upcoming release of Android N is going to cause problems for many apps that use SQLite. In some cases, these problems include an increased risk of data corruption. This platform change also affects libraries built upon SQLite such as Akavache, Couchbase Lite and MvvmCross. There are 857 forks of SQLite-net on GitHub - are you using one of those directly or indirectly via an dependency?

Security "Crypto" provider deprecated in Android N

From Android N, If your application derives keys using the SHA1PRNG algorithm from the Crypto provider, you must start using a real key derivation function and possibly re-encrypt your data.

IOS

Apple will require HTTPS connections for iOS apps by the end of 2016

Start planning your server upgrades accordingly, within six months connectivity to your web services will require TLS 1.2 over https.

The new App Store

John Gruber with the best round up of the huge App Store changes (Subscription Pricing, Faster Approvals, and Search Ads) which were announced on Wednesday.

Xamarin remote iOS simulator updated

Xamarin has released a second preview of the iOS Simulator for Xamarin.VS. The remoted iOS Simulator provides you with a way to test and debug iOS apps on the simulator entirely from Visual Studio on Windows.

AIDatePickerController ported to Xamarin.iOS

Marc Bruins has ported the ObjectiveC date picker library AIDatePickerController over to Xamarin.iOS. A binary package is now available on NuGet and source code is on GitHub.

MAC

How iOS Apps on the Mac could work

Ben Sandofsky with a fantastic article on the challenges and possible solutions around bringing UIKit to the Mac.

XAMARIN FORMS

Xamarin.Forms UI designer beta released

Change view properties while your application is running. Web developers have had this luxury for years. Isn’t time you did?

Flip through items with CarouselView

CarouselView is the successor of the previous CarouselPage which had restrictions in that it could not be embedded. In contrast, the new CarouselView can be embedded. In this post, James Montemagno builds an application using the latest preview release of Xamarin.Forms.(v2.3.0)

Animating a button when clicked

David Britch (Xamarin) demonstrates how to use the EventHandlerBehaviour and FaceAction classes to run an animation when an event occurs.

MVVMCROSS

RecyclerView TemplateSelector

Sometimes you need to layout items of a RecyclerView differently, especially if binding to an ItemSource that contains different types. In this post, Sven-Michael Stübe implements polymorphic data binding on Android using MvxRecyclerView.

WHO'S HIRING/LOOKING

“Delight developers” is our mantra. Come say it with us.

Xamarin is looking for talented individuals to join the team and help delight developers and make it fast, easy and fun to build great mobile apps.

Senior iOS Engineer @ The Huffington Post - Onsite in NYC

Work with emerging technologies, join an incredible engineering culture, deliver to millions.

AND FINALLY...

When you get rejection, it’s a call to action. It’s a piece of positive feedback that says you’re not ready just yet, but someday you might be. Someday you could be. Someday…you will be. - Jon Westenberg