There was a time when mobile application development was restricted to a single operating system be it iOS, Android or Windows. But gradually as technology advanced, so did the capabilities of mobile apps and the business of developing mobile apps became more competitive. Developers began looking at solutions that served a larger audience but with reduced developmental costs to survive the cut-throat competition. Platform independent mobile app development gained prominence and this gave rise to hybrid, cross-platform or multi-platform app development frameworks like Cordova, PhoneGap, Ionic and Xamarin. Of these frameworks, Xamarin has received wide acclaim as one of the most powerful, unique and versatile technologies. What is it about Xamarin that makes it a favorite of the developer community? Let’s analyze:
Best of both worlds with Xamarin Xamarin eliminates the dependency on native software development languages such as Java or C. But it still provides all the critical features offered by native apps. Xamarin provides support for applications built using traditional languages by offering functions and features that directly invoke native language libraries. The basic premise of Xamarin is quite simple: the app is coded entirely in C# and later compiled to work seamlessly on iOS, Android, Windows Phone, Mac etc. Some of Xamarin’s superior features that make app development close to native:
Simple but Sophisticated App Development Xamarin simplifies cross platform mobile development and enables businesses to ship higher quality apps faster with more confidence. It allows development for all the leading platforms – using a single, shared codebase. Developers can use the same IDE, language, and APIs everywhere and automate the lifecycle of iOS, Android, Windows and macOS apps. And C# is universally considered the best language for mobile app development because anything you can accomplish with Objective-C, Swift or Java, you can do with C#. Since Xamarin apps use native UIs on every platform, they give the best possible outcomes. Cross-Platform Testing Once the app is developed, you can perform a final round of testing before submitting it to the app store. Xamarin’s Test Cloud allows developers to test on multiple devices with advanced performance tracking abilities. It lets you to detect bugs and defects faster. Xamarin.Forms Another offering from Xamarin is Xamarin.Forms - a UI toolkit that enables Xamarin multi-platform application development. It allows developers to build native UI layouts that can be shared across Android, iOS and Windows. Xamarin.Forms maximizes code sharing to the fullest and is ideal for apps where developers comfortable with XAML and don’t require much platform-specific functionality. At present, Xamarin.Forms are widely used for prototyping or to build internal enterprise apps that don’t have a mass target audience, or even for simple, short-term apps. Conclusion With the surge in trends like Enterprise mobility, BYOD and the explosion of iOS and Android device usage for work and personal use, there is a great deal of pressure on businesses to provide fast and feature-rich app experiences to their employees and customers on all the major operating systems. Many projects are delayed or exceed the budget because of technical complexities of developing for each platform. Add to it the shortage of resources skilled in each platform’s unique programming language. As a result, Xamarin seems the most palatable, cost-friendly solution with its unified development, re-use of existing developer skills, and the ability to share about 90 percent of the source code across device platforms. What are your views on this? Please let us know in the comments box below. Your comment will be posted after it is approved.
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