Microsoft’s Maddy Leger. Program manager for all things Xamarin.Forms Tools, talks about Hot ReLoading and much more
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MVVM Ping Pong
Here’s a problem I come across more often than I would have expected. 
I want my buttons to use Commands in the View Model, but in response to the command, I have to interact with the user in a way that is much easier to do in the code behind.
Let’s take the example of a user pressing a button to delete a record. The button calls a command in the ViewModel, but I want to show a confirmation dialog box in the view. If the user affirms the deletion, I want to do the work back in the View Model. Oy.
Xamarin Quick Hit: Dimming a button to indicate it is disabled
I often have to dim a button to indicate that it is disabled, and I want to do that via data binding.
Visual Studio for Mac – my newest Pluralsight Course
At the core of effective application development is a thorough knowledge of Visual Studio Mac. In this course, Visual Studio for Mac, you will learn how to work with VS Mac to produce enterprise-quality software.
First, you will explore the IDE by taking an extensive tour. Next, you will learn how Visual Studio Mac supports source control; specifically Git. Finally, you will discover how Visual Studio Mac supports Azure. When you are finished with this course, you will have a foundational knowledge of this integrated development environment that will help you as you move forward to creating software.
Posted in ASP.NET Core, Essentials, Visual Studio, Xamarin
Tagged Xamarin
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Learn to Program (From Scratch!)
John Papa and I have just released our new Play by Play on Learning To Program. If you know of someone who has wanted to learn to code but didn’t know where to start, this might be a great option.
Posted in Essentials, Learning, Programming
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App Center Distribution
In my previous posts I showed how to get started with App Center and how to build an app on App Center. In this post, I will demonstrate how to distribute your shiny new app to your alpha or beta testers.
Distribution
Return to App Center and confirm that your application has been built with the latest check in. Next, create your distribution group.
Create A Distribution Group
To do so, click on Distribute Groups, where you will see a button in the upper right hand corner: New Group.
Create and name your group (e.g., Alpha Testers) . You can allow public access , but then device registration won’t work (at least for now). Leave this off, and enter email addresses into the box labeled Who would you like to invite to this group?
Yet Another Podcast #181 – Matthew Robbins on MFractor
Matthew Robbins is a Xamarin and Microsoft MVP and he is the creator of MFractor, a mobile-first utility for Visual Studio Mac.
Our site: https://www.mfractor.com/
Documentation: http://docs.mfractor.com/
Localisation Tooling Blog: https://www.mfractor.
Notice: Yet Another Podcast listeners can use the following discount code for 10% off MFractor Professional! YET-ANOTHER-PODCAST
Posted in Podcast, Product Reviews, Programming, Recommendations, Tools and Utilities, Xamarin
Tagged YapCast
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Building Your App On App Center
In my previous (and first) blog post on App Center I talked about getting started, adding the SDK to your code, and looking at Analytics and Crash reporting. In this post I’d like to discuss building your app on App Center; which allows you to distribute your app to Beta testers and others.
There are a few steps in setting up and configuring your build process, but once done, building is as simple as pressing a button (or, even simpler, you can set it up to build on every push to your source control!)
Posted in App Center, Essentials, Xamarin
Tagged App Center, Xamarin
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Getting Started with VS App Center
There is no doubt that Microsoft’s VS App Center is an incredible resource 
for mobile application programmers. The problem is that it seems hard to get started. The good news is that once you get started, it turns out to be wicked easy!
For this blog post, I’m going to assume that you are already sold that App Center is the Cat’s Meow; if not check out this article by Microsoft on why App Center is so cool.
The short version is that App Center allows you to Build your application in the cloud, directly from your repository. You can Test (using Xamarin Cloud) and you can Distribute to beta testers. You can also set up and view analytics and crash reports. Finally, you can set up push notifications.
In the next few blog posts I’ll go over each of these areas, and be sure to keep an eye out for my forthcoming course on App Center on LinkedIn Learning (part of my Azure Essentials series) . You’ll find these posts on Wintellect’s blog and on my own.
Posted in App Center, Essentials, Xamarin
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Shawn Wildermuth on “Hello World – The Film” and much more
Shawn Wildermuth has been tinkering with computers and software since he got a Vic-20 back in the early ‘80s.
As a Microsoft MVP since 2003, he’s also involved with Microsoft as an ASP.NET Insider and ClientDev Insider. You may have taken one of his more than twenty courses on Pluralsight
He’s authored eight books and innumerable articles on software development. You can also see him at one of the local and international conferences he’s spoken at including TechEd, Oredev, SDC, NDC, VSLive, DevIntersection, MIX, Devteach, DevConnections and Dev Reach.
He is one of the Wilder Minds. You can reach him at his blog. He’s also making his first, feature-length, documentary about software developers today called “Hello World: The Film”. You can see more about it here.
Posted in Essentials
Tagged YapCast
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Creating A Generic Report in Xamarin.Forms
I recently had a client who wanted to create simple reports that consisted of a variable number of columns, followed by a “more” button that takes you to a page with the full details. 
The problem was that they didn’t want to hard-code anything. They wanted the ability to add reports without sending out a new version of the software, and they wanted to be able to pick which columns were visible. Yikes!
Posted in Essentials, Xamarin, XAML
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Jeff Fritz on ASP.NET Core
Jeffrey T. Fritz is a senior program manager in Microsoft’s Developer Outreach Group that works with the community on open source projects and the new Microsoft .NET Core 
framework. As a long time web developer with experience in large and small applications across a variety of verticals, he knows how to build for performance and practicality. More recently, he has worked closely with developers to teach them to succeed with new tools and frameworks from Microsoft and Telerik