Several topics will be covered in this intro presentation including: How to create a Xamarin Forms solution, as well as emulator tips, navigation, images, event handlers, device form factors and list views. The end result will be a typical app with a Main navigation page, a list view page and a detail page that you can use as a template for building future apps!

2. about the instructor
Russ Fustino
http://www.fustinobrothers.com
Twitter: @RussFustino
Russ@FustinoBrothers.com
Algorand Technical Evangelist
Russ Fustino, Microsoft MVP 2013-2018
CEO Fustino Brothers, Inc
Former Developer Evangelist for Microsoft,
Xamarin, Raygun, Wowza, ComponentOne and
OutSystems
Publisher of Several Windows, iOS & Android Apps
Publisher of Jethro Tull App, Endorsed
Book author – Azure and Xamarin Forms

3. Sept 23, 2012 May 7, 2015Nov 1, 2014
July 2018

4. App Studio Version released
5www.FustinoBrothers.com | @FustinoBrothers
FBI: 850.366.3232 | Fax: 1.856.267.1568

5. What were the Challenges?
• How to navigate in App?
• Images in iOS and Android
• Background Image on ContentPage was stretched on Android
• Xamarin Forms WebView Control did not have a enable
JavaScript property
• File IO was in a different project location for each platform
• How to leverage XAML:
• Phone vs Tablet
• Portrait vs Landscape
• I need components … third party controls … Grid Layout
ListView.

6. Xamarin Forms:
• Navigation
• Images
• Custom Renderers
• Embedded Resources
• XAML, Building for Phone and Tablet
• Third party controls and plugins
• Dependency Injection
Submission Challenges
Create a Xamarin Forms App
agenda

7. Xamarin Forms

9. Introduction
What is Xamarin.Forms?
Xamarin.Forms is a cross-
platform UI framework to
create mobile apps for:
Android 4.0+
iOS 6.1+
Windows 10 UWP

11. 95% code sharing Xamarin Forms

14. A View is the base class for all visual controls, most
standard controls are present

16. • Android version choked using image cell and large
images for thumbnails
• Use Aspect=AspectFit, AspectFill or Fill property on
Image control
• Use small images for Thumbnails - Discography, ListView
was dying in Android
• Expand Java Heap to 1G in Android project settings
• Thin out all images (save as web)
• Make all images .PNG because they are optimized in iOS

18. • Make as many images as embedded as you can
• Images will display quicker
• Downside: May make the app too big
• Anything over 50 Meg for Android on Google Play, needs expansion
files for submission
• Anything over 100 Meg for iOS will not install over Cellular, just Wi-Fi
• We ended up moving most of the images to a server for the
Discography Details. This got the app down to around 25 meg
for Android and 50 meg for iOS.

19. • Custom renderers extend the control to platform specific use
• isScriptable property is not exposed in XF WebView control
https://developer.xamarin.com/guides/xamarin-forms/custom-
renderer/

20. • This link was our saving grace for the stretched and tiled
background image problems we were seeing.
http://java.dzone.com/articles/using-full-size-none-stretched

21. • Tablet and Phone view in the same set of XAML
• Cannot have more than one root for a context page
• StackPanels within a StackPanel or Grid is fine, you just cant
have multiple root views

24. https://github.com/jamesmontemagno/Xamarin.Plugins
http://mrgestures.com/
https://www.syncfusion.com/

25. .NET Standard Shared Platform specific code

26. Submission Challenges

27. • Android Google Play – Need to use Android in app
purchase process for payments
• Amazon Store – Need to provide proof we had the rights
to use “Jethro Tull” as the name of the app.
• iOS App Store – We had to remove all competitive
platforms for Music. Only iTunes is available. Had to
remove Xbox, Google Play, Amazon Music.
• App Store – We had to remove use of Apple Logo and
iTunes Logo as part of our design
• iOS approval is slow 7-10 days!

28. Creating your first App

30. When starting a new project

31. • A page is an Activity in Android, a View Controller in iOS
and a Page in UWP.

32. Tull App
https://developer.xamarin.com/samples/xamarin-forms/all/
(Forms Gallery)
https://www.syncfusion.com/xamarin-ui-controls
(Syncfusion Control Explorer for XF)

33. Creating our first Xamarin.Forms app

34. Tasks
• Layout containers
• Adding Views
• Fine-tuning layout

35. Layout Containers organize child elements based on specific rules

36. Layout Containers organize child elements based on specific rules

37. Layout Containers organize child elements based on specific rules

38. Layout Containers organize child elements based on specific rules

39. Layout Containers organize child elements based on specific rules

40. Used to create typical form style layout

41. Used to create rows and columns of information,
children identify specific column, row and span

45. Solution to Xamarin Intro Chapter
Code at:
https://github.com/apress/azure-and-xamarin-forms

46. Xamarin Forms:
• Navigation
• Images
• Custom Renderers
• Embedded Resources
• XAML, Building for Phone and Tablet
• Third party controls and plugins
• Dependency Injection
Submission Challenges
Creating your first app
summary

48. www.Xamarin.com
https://rink.hockeyapp.net
http://xamarin.com/forms

49. https://github.com/jamesmontemagno/xamarin.plugins
https://github.com/MindscapeHQ/raygun4net#affected-
user-tracking
https://github.com/MindscapeHQ/raygun4net#tags-
and-custom-data
https://raygun.io/docs/languages/net

50. https://raygun.io/docs/languages
https://raygun.io/docs/plugins/
https://raygun.io/docs/workflow/
https://raygun.io/blog/
https://raygun.io/blog/case-studies/
http://developer.xamarin.com/guides/cross-platform/xamarin-
forms/dependency-service/

51. Xamarin Publishing
http://developer.xamarin.com/guides/ios/deployment,_testi
ng,_and_metrics/app_distribution_overview/publishing_to_t
he_app_store/
https://forums.xamarin.com/discussion/40388/disallowed-
paths-itunesmetadata-plist-found-at-when-submitting-to-
app-store/p1
http://developer.xamarin.com/guides/android/deployment,_
testing,_and_metrics/publishing_an_application

52. http://developer.xamarin.com/guides/cross-
platform/xamarin-forms/controls/pages/
http://motzcod.es/post/104507063997/what-exactly-is-a-
plugin-for-xamarin
http://blog.xamarin.com/creating-reusable-plugins-for-
xamarin.forms/
https://bugzilla.xamarin.com/show_bug.cgi?id=27265

53. http://mrgestures.com/
http://java.dzone.com/articles/using-full-size-none-stretched
https://www.nuget.org/packages/Xam.Plugins.Forms.ImageCircle
https://gist.github.com/jamesmontemagno/a70ffa4a3d16972a3369

54. http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=3108
http://forums.xamarin.com/discussion/19362/xamarin-forms-splashscreen-
in-android
http://forums.xamarin.com/discussion/25768/iphone-code-signing-key-
other-developer-name-xxxxx-not-found-in-keychain

55. https://developers.google.com/android-publisher/
http://www.appbrain.com/stats/android-market-app-categories
https://play.google.com/about/developer-content-policy.html
https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-
developer/answer/113474
https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/
https://developer.apple.com/app-store/
https://developer.apple.com/library/ios/documentation/Language
sUtilities/Conceptual/iTunesConnect_Guide/Appendices/Propertie
s.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40011225-CH26-SW2

56. http://components.xamarin.com/view/xamarin.inappbilling
http://developer.xamarin.com/guides/cross-platform/xamarin-forms/dependency-
service/
https://components.xamarin.com/gettingstarted/xamarin.inapppurchase
http://blog.xamarin.com/behaviors-in-xamarin.forms/
https://github.com/jamesmontemagno/Xamarin.Plugins