Xamarin Blog

An open source mobile platform for building Android, iOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS apps with .NET.

Xamarin Platform - Xamarin Blog

Using Object Detection from inside your Xamarin app

September 6, 2018 Sep 6, 2018 09/6/18
Jim Bennett
Microsoft Cognitive Services provide a great way to get started with AI without being a machine learning or data science expert. A common favorite of cognitive services is the Custom Vision Service. The first version of this service allowed you to easily build an image classifier model that you could access either via a REST API (with an SDK available for Xamarin apps), or by downloading a model that can be run on your device using either CoreML, TensorFlow or WindowsML (we looked at using TensorFlow in an Android app in an earlier blog post).

Securing network traffic with TLS 1.2

August 7, 2018 Aug 7, 2018 08/7/18
Tom Opgenorth
Secure and encrypted network communications are a crucial part of mobile application development. Without some kind of security around the communication layer, it is trivial for a third party to eavesdrop and tamper with the messages between the client and the server. If protecting the data being transmitted is important, then some kind of cryptography must be involved to protect both the sender and the receiver from malicious eyes.

Previewing Files Inside Your Xamarin.iOS App

July 25, 2018 Jul 25, 2018 07/25/18
Jimmy Garrido
If your app interacts with files, such as email attachments or photos, allowing users to preview those files without leaving your app is a great way to enhance the user's experience. Fortunately, iOS makes adding this feature simple by providing the document interaction controller and the Quick Look preview controller. In this post, you will learn the differences between the two options and how you can implement them in your app.

Export To Application Insights With AppCenter Continuous Export

July 9, 2018 Jul 9, 2018 07/9/18
Mayur Tendulkar
Five-star mobile apps have one special feature: they don’t let go of their users. This can be achieved by understanding your app, the app’s users, and how these users interact with your app. The deep customer insights offered by AppCenter's Continuous Export provide a better understanding of your customers and help boost retention. By default, you receive information about your active users, their active sessions, top devices, country, language, and more!

The Xamarin Show: Exploring Awesome Xamarin & Visual Studio Features

July 5, 2018 Jul 5, 2018 07/5/18
James Montemagno
Each week on The Xamarin Show we explore the latest and greatest in Xamarin development by looking at new features built into Visual Studio, build native cross-platform user interfaces with Xamarin.Forms, and access to native APIs with Xamarin.Essentials. I am also joined by Xamarin experts that show off the awesome beautiful libraries and applications they are building with Xamarin. No matter what type of development you are into there is surely something for you over on The Xamarin Show. This week, I wanted to feature a few "Snack Pack" episodes that show off an awesome feature in under 10 minutes!

More Cross-Platform APIs with Xamarin.Essentials Latest Preview

June 14, 2018 Jun 14, 2018 06/14/18
James Montemagno
We announced Xamarin.Essentials, a core set of cross-platform APIs to help developers build native apps, at Microsoft Build 2018. Xamarin.Essentials gives developers access to over thirty platform-specific APIs that can be accessed from their shared code, including geolocation, secure storage, sensors, device information, and many more. Best of all, Xamarin.Essentials can be used in any iOS, Android, UWP, or Xamarin.Forms app, regardless of how you create the user interface. Feedback on the first preview from developers has been fantastic, with praise of a simple and straightforward way to access these native features.

Xamarin.Essentials: Cross-Platform APIs for Mobile Apps

May 16, 2018 May 16, 2018 05/16/18
James Montemagno
When developing iOS and Android apps with Xamarin, developers can access every native platform API using C#. These bindings not only expose the platform APIs in C#, but add powerful C# features, such as async/await, events, delegates, and more. This is a huge advantage for developers, because they never have to leave C#, whether they're writing shared business logic, user interface, or accessing native features. One key feature developers often look for when developing cross-platform apps with Xamarin is a way to access common native features from their shared code without having to write their own abstractions or find an open source plugin created by the community.