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  • v11.1.99.218

    December 08, 2020
  • v11.1.99.168 Changes

    November 10, 2020

    What's new in Xamarin.Android 11.2

    November 10, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 11.1.99.168 was published as part of Visual Studio 2019 version 16.9 Preview 1 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.9 Preview 1.

    ๐Ÿš€ Corresponding Visual Studio 2019 Preview release notes

    What's new

    ๐Ÿ”ง Deprecations, removals, and default configuration changes

    ๐Ÿš€ Build and deployment performance

    ๐ŸŽ GitHub PR 5188: Improve performance by lazily loading an Android resource mapping file that is only used for error messages. This reduced the overall build time by 348 milliseconds in a real-world project in an initial clean build or incremental builds with Android resource changes.

    ๐Ÿš€ Rewritten fast deployment system

    ๐Ÿš€ As part of this update, the fast deployment system used for Debugging apps has been changed. The shared runtime and shared platform packages are no longer used or required.

    The new system also no longer uses the external drive for the fast deployment files. All of the files and tooling are now stored in the application's internal directory. This has an advantage in that when the application is uninstalled, all of the files and the tooling will be removed as well.

    ๐Ÿ‘ The new system will not work on any devices older than Android 5.0 Lollipop (API level 21). This is because it relies on features that only work from API level 21 onwards. Also API level 21 is the lowest supported platform for the runtime, so running and debugging on older devices will be impossible.

    ๐Ÿ“š See Documentation for more details.

    ๐Ÿ—„ Deprecation of DebugType full and pdbonly

    warning XA0125: 'AndroidApp1.pdb' is using a deprecated debug
    information level. Set the debugging information to Portable in the
    Visual Studio project property pages or edit the project file in a
    text editor and set the 'DebugType' MSBuild property to 'portable' to
    use the newer, cross-platform debug information level. If this file
    comes from a NuGet package, update to a newer version of the NuGet
    package or notify the library author.
    

    Support for .mdb or .pdb symbols files that were built with the DebugType MSBuild property set to full or pdbonly is now deprecated. This applies to .mdb and .pdb files in application projects as well as in referenced libraries, including NuGet packages.

    ๐Ÿ Set DebugType to portable in the application project as well all library references. portable is the recommended setting for all projects from now on. The older full and pdbonly settings are for older Windows-specific file formats. .NET 6 and higher will not support those older formats.

    ๐Ÿ— In Visual Studio, go to Properties > Build > Advanced in the project property pages and change Debugging information to Portable.

    ๐Ÿ— In Visual Studio for Mac, go to Build > Compiler > Debug information in the project property pages and change Debug information to Portable.

    โšก๏ธ If the problematic symbol file comes from a NuGet package, update to a newer version of the package or notify the library author.

    ๐Ÿ—„ Deprecation of AAPT in favor of AAPT2

    warning XA1026: Using AAPT is deprecated in favor of AAPT2. Please enable 'Use incremental Android packaging system (aapt2)' in the Visual Studio project property pages or edit the project file in a text editor and set the 'AndroidUseAapt2' MSBuild property to 'true'.
    

    ๐Ÿ—„ Google has deprecated the AAPT command-line tool in favor of AAPT2 going forward. Xamarin.Android has accordingly now deprecated <AndroidUseAapt2>false</AndroidUseAapt2> as well.

    ๐Ÿ‘‰ Update the AndroidUseAapt2 MSBuild property to true to select AAPT2. This property corresponds to the Use incremental Android packaging system (aapt2) setting in the Visual Studio project properties pages. Alternatively, remove <AndroidUseAapt2> from the .csproj file to let the build select the default value true.

    Important : AAPT2 will in some cases enforce stricter rules on resource files than the previous AAPT, so some adjustments might be needed if you see new error messages that come from AAPT2 itself rather than from the Xamarin.Android build tasks.

    If needed, the --legacy switch can run AAPT2 in an AAPT compatibility mode. Add the following to your .csproj file:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<AndroidAapt2CompileExtraArgs\>--legacy\</AndroidAapt2CompileExtraArgs\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    ๐Ÿ‘ Better file association for Android manifest syntax errors

    Syntax errors in AndroidManifest.xml previously always referred to the generated version of the file (like obj\Debug\90\android\manifest\AndroidManifest.xml), even for syntax errors that were also present in the manually configured input Properties\AndroidManifest.xml file. Android manifest errors are now fixed up to point to the Properties\AndroidManifest.xml file. The errors also now include a note to inform users that manifest generation attributes in source code files can be responsible for the errors in some cases.

    ๐Ÿ‘ Removal of ${library.imports:} support in AndroidResgenExtraArgs MSBuild property

    ๐Ÿšš A text templating feature for AAPT and AAPT2 has been removed that provided a workaround for the Amazon Fire Phone:

    \<AndroidResgenExtraArgs\>-I ${library.imports:eac-api.jar} -I ${library.imports:euclid-api.jar}\</AndroidResgenExtraArgs\>
    

    The ${library.imports:...} syntax should no longer be needed by modern Android libraries. .aar files are the recommended way for Java/Kotlin libraries to distribute Android resources to be consumed by Xamarin.Android application projects.

    ๐Ÿšš Note that the AndroidResgenExtraArgs and AndroidAapt2LinkExtraArgs MSBuild properties will continue to pass additional arguments to aapt and aapt2 link with the ${library.imports:...} syntax removed.

    ๐Ÿ‘ UseShortFileNames=false is no longer supported

    In previous versions of Xamarin.Android, you could set the UseShortFileNames MSbuild property in your .csproj file:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<UseShortFileNames\>false\</UseShortFileNames\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    This would tell Xamarin.Android's MSBuild targets to use the "long" folder names such as:

    • obj\Debug\lp -> __library_projects__
    • obj\Debug\lp*\jl -> library_project_imports
    • obj\Debug\lp*\nl -> native_library_imports

    ๐Ÿ This was useful when UseShortFileNames was a new feature, giving developers a way to "opt out" if they hit a bug. However, UseShortFileNames has defaulted to true since around July 2017 to help with the Windows API maximum path length limitation.

    ๐Ÿšš This functionality has been removed from Xamarin.Android. Short file names will be used going forward.

    ๐Ÿ›  Notable issues fixed

    ๐Ÿš€ Application and library build and deployment

    Developer Community 1184573: Xamarin Android falsely saying that Resource does not exist in the current context (CS0103). Duplicate attr elements in declare-styleable styles were causing the design-time build system to crash. As a result the Resource.designer.cs was not being updated.

    Developer Community 1036602, GitHub Issue 5009: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.2, .pdb files were not included in the APK if the managed linker was enabled.

    ๐Ÿš€ GitHub Issue 4996: application deploy on Android 11 emulator fails with Mono.AndroidTools.AdbException: secure_mkdirs failed: Permission denied

    ๐Ÿ— Github PR 5107: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, building solutions in parallel with msbuild YourSolution.sln -m could fail with errors such as:

    obj\Release\100\android\manifest\AndroidManifest.xml(7,0): error APT2260: resource mipmap/ic_launcher (aka com.companyname.skiasharpsample:mipmap/ic_launcher) not found.
    obj\Release\100\android\manifest\AndroidManifest.xml(7,0): error APT2260: resource string/app_name (aka com.companyname.skiasharpsample:string/app_name) not found.
    obj\Release\100\android\manifest\AndroidManifest.xml(7,0): error APT2260: resource mipmap/ic_launcher_round (aka com.companyname.skiasharpsample:mipmap/ic_launcher_round) not found.
    obj\Release\100\android\manifest\AndroidManifest.xml(9,0): error APT2260: resource style/MainTheme.Splash (aka com.companyname.skiasharpsample:style/MainTheme.Splash) not found.
    Xamarin.Android.Aapt2.targets(226,3): error APT2067: failed processing manifest.
    

    ๐Ÿ›  All enhancements and issues fixed in Xamarin.Android 11.2

    GitHub enhancements

    GitHub bugs

    ๐Ÿ›  Developer Community

    Other changes in Xamarin.Android 11.2

    Other changes

    Thank you

    A big _ Thank You! _ to community members who contributed improvements in this release:

    Installing

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 11.2 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories:

  • v11.1.0.3 Changes

    September 14, 2020

    September 14, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 11.1.0.3 was published as part of Visual Studio 2019 version 16.8 Preview 3 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.8 Preview 3.

    ๐Ÿš€ Corresponding Visual Studio 2019 Preview release notes

    What's new

    0๏ธโƒฃ android:extractNativeLibs set to "true" by default

    ๐Ÿš€ Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, projects that had references to the Xamarin.AndroidX NuGet packages or that were otherwise configured to use the improved manifest merging option would get a value of "false" by default for the android:extractNativeLibs Android manifest attribute due to changes in the latest version of the manifest merger tool from Google. Because this value had previously been "true" when left blank, this could cause unexpected behavior changes for Xamarin.Android applications. Xamarin.Android now now sets this attribute it to "true" by default even when using the improved manifest merging.

    ๐Ÿ“š According to the Android documentation, extractNativeLibs affects APK size and install size:

    ๐Ÿ“ฆ > Whether or not the package installer extracts native libraries from the APK to the filesystem. If set to false, then your native libraries must be page aligned and stored uncompressed in the APK. No code changes are required as the linker loads the libraries directly from the APK at runtime.

    This is a tradeoff that each developer should decide upon on a per-application basis. Is a smaller install size at the cost of a larger download size preferred?

    Xamarin.Android now emits android:extractNativeLibs="true" by default, preferring smaller APK sizes. You can get the opposite behavior with an AndroidManifest.xml such as:

    \<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?\> \<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"android:versionCode="1" android:versionName="1.0" package="com.companyname.hello"\> \<uses-sdk android:minSdkVersion="23" android:targetSdkVersion="30" /\> \<application android:label="Hello" android:extractNativeLibs="false" /\> \</manifest\>
    

    ๐Ÿ— apksigner from Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0.3 now included

    ๐Ÿ— Xamarin.Android now packages its own copy of the apksigner executable. The current included version is aligned with Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0.3.

    ๐Ÿš€ Attempting to use the upstream apksigner that's packaged in Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0 from the Android SDK Manager with Java JDK 8 results in the following error, as mentioned in the Xamarin.Android 11.0 release notes:

    java.lang.UnsupportedClassVersionError: com/android/apksigner/ApkSignerTool has been compiled by a more recent version of the Java Runtime (class file version 53.0), this version of the Java Runtime only recognizes class file versions up to 52.0
    

    ๐Ÿ— The new apksigner that is now included as part of Xamarin.Android matches the source version of the upstream tool but is built against Java JDK 8 so that Xamarin.Android can now use Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0 alongside Java JDK 8.

    ๐Ÿ›  Issues fixed

    ๐Ÿš€ Application and library build and deployment

    Developer Community 1144021 and GitHub 4990: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, ADB0010: [INSTALL_FAILED_INVALID_APK: Failed to extract native libraries, res=-2] build error could prevent apps from being deployed after AndroidManifest.xml changes.

    Developer Community 1157593: Modifications to files set to use the AndroidAsset Build Action were not included as expected in incremental builds. Clean rebuilds were required to propagate the changes as expected.

    GitHub 1597: Marshaling of java.util.Map instances in files set to use the AndroidInterfaceDescription Build Action was incorrect.

    โšก๏ธ GitHub 4986: Updates to Android tooling (manifest-merger), caused //application/@android:extractNativeLibs to be set to "false" by default. This could cause an undesirable APK file size increase that was more noticeable for Xamarin.Android applications using AOT. Xamarin.Android now sets extractNativeLibs to "true" by default.

    GitHub 4996: On Android 11 devices and emulators, Mono.AndroidTools.AdbException: secure_mkdirs failed: Permission denied could prevent deployment in the Debug configuration.

    GitHub 4998: Files under lib/ must have .so extension, found 'lib/x86/gdbserver'. build error prevented building app bundles for projects with references to Android C++ library projects.

    ๐Ÿ‘ GitHub 5024: error XA0119: Using the shared runtime and Android App Bundles at the same time is not currently supported build error could mistakenly appear for Xamarin.Android class libraries when the AndroidPackageFormat MSBuild property was set to aab.

    GitHub PR 5038: Errors similar to error APT2260: resource drawable/icon (aka com.contoso.androidapp:drawable/icon) not found could prevent building projects that were using ResizetizerNT and google-services.json together. The build system has now been updated to ensure each resource directory has its own unique cache file.

    ๐Ÿ”‹ GitHub 5049: Starting in Visual Studio 2019 version 16.7, build errors similar to Feature 'XYZ' is not available in C# 7.3. Please use language version 8.0 or greater. could prevent projects from using C# 8.0 language features.

    Application behavior on device and emulator

    • GitHub 4989: Calling this.Dispose() from within a Java.Lang.Object.Dispose(bool) override threw a System.ArgumentException.

    Bindings projects

    Java.Interop GitHub 694: Kotlin synthetic constructors were not yet ignored, resulting in unactionable error messages such as:

    Error while processing '[Constructor] MaterialDialog(android.content.Context p0, com.afollestad.materialdialogs.DialogBehavior p1, int p2, kotlin.jvm.internal.DefaultConstructorMarker p3)' in '[Class] com.afollestad.materialdialogs.MaterialDialog': Type 'kotlin.jvm.internal.DefaultConstructorMarker' was not found.
    

    Installing

    โšก๏ธ To get the new version in Visual Studio, update Visual Studio:

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 11.1 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories:

  • v11.1.0.17 Changes

    November 10, 2020

    November 10, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 11.1.0.17 was published as part of Visual Studio 2019 version 16.8 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.8.

    ๐Ÿš€ Corresponding Visual Studio 2019 release notes

    What's new compared to Xamarin.Android 11.0

    ๐Ÿ”ง Deprecations, removals, and default configuration changes

    ๐Ÿš€ Build and deployment performance

    ๐Ÿ— GitHub PR 4975: Cache the results of the FilterAssemblies MSBuild task in memory so they can be reused across different MSBuild targets during the build. This decreased incremental build times for the Xamarin.Forms source build from about 170 milliseconds to about 100 milliseconds on a test system. The savings will be bigger on larger solutions.

    0๏ธโƒฃ android:extractNativeLibs set to "true" by default

    ๐Ÿš€ Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, projects that had references to the Xamarin.AndroidX NuGet packages or that were otherwise configured to use the improved manifest merging option would get a value of "false" by default for the android:extractNativeLibs Android manifest attribute due to changes in the latest version of the manifest merger tool from Google. Because this value had previously been "true" when left blank, this could cause unexpected behavior changes for Xamarin.Android applications. Xamarin.Android now sets this attribute to "true" by default even when using the improved manifest merging.

    ๐Ÿ“š According to the Android documentation, extractNativeLibs affects APK size and install size:

    ๐Ÿ“ฆ > Whether or not the package installer extracts native libraries from the APK to the filesystem. If set to false, then your native libraries must be page aligned and stored uncompressed in the APK. No code changes are required as the linker loads the libraries directly from the APK at runtime.

    This is a tradeoff that each developer should decide upon on a per-application basis. Is a smaller install size at the cost of a larger download size preferred?

    Xamarin.Android now emits android:extractNativeLibs="true" by default, preferring smaller APK sizes. You can get the opposite behavior with an AndroidManifest.xml such as:

    \<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?\> \<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"android:versionCode="1" android:versionName="1.0" package="com.companyname.hello"\> \<uses-sdk android:minSdkVersion="23" android:targetSdkVersion="30" /\> \<application android:label="Hello" android:extractNativeLibs="false" /\> \</manifest\>
    

    Corrected garbage collection behavior for Android bindings and bindings projects

    In previous Xamarin.Android versions, errors similar to JNI DETECTED ERROR IN APPLICATION: use of deleted global reference and JNI ERROR (app bug): attempt to use stale Global 0x2a2a (should be 0x2a26) could cause apps to abort under certain specific timing conditions where a managed garbage collection started just after a Java.Lang.Object subclass method call.

    ๐Ÿ— The Xamarin.Android bindings project build process now includes a fix for this issue.

    โšก๏ธ The set of Android API bindings that are included directly as part of the Xamarin.Android SDK have been updated accordingly to include the fix.

    Note: This fix will not solve the problem for other bindings libraries until the libraries are rebuilt using this new Xamarin.Android version. Bindings library authors are therefore encouraged to build and publish new versions of their libraries using this new Xamarin.Android version at their earliest convenience.

    ๐Ÿ— apksigner from Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0.3 now included

    ๐Ÿ— Xamarin.Android now packages its own copy of the apksigner executable. The current included version is aligned with Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0.3.

    ๐Ÿš€ Attempting to use the upstream apksigner that's packaged in Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0 from the Android SDK Manager with Java JDK 8 results in the following error, as mentioned in the Xamarin.Android 11.0 release notes:

    java.lang.UnsupportedClassVersionError: com/android/apksigner/ApkSignerTool has been compiled by a more recent version of the Java Runtime (class file version 53.0), this version of the Java Runtime only recognizes class file versions up to 52.0
    

    ๐Ÿ— The new apksigner that is now included as part of Xamarin.Android matches the source version of the upstream tool but is built against Java JDK 8 so that Xamarin.Android can now use Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0 alongside Java JDK 8.

    โšก๏ธ Default Android SDK Platform-Tools version update to 30.0

    โšก๏ธ The default Android SDK Platform-Tools version has been updated from 29.0.5 to 30.0.4. This version can be changed per-project if needed via the AndroidSdkPlatformToolsVersion MSBuild property.

    Note: Unlike the Platform-Tools, the default Android SDK Build-Tools version is still 29.0.2 in this release. Projects that attempt to override the AndroidSdkBuildToolsVersion MSBuild property to a 30.0.x version will currently fail to build with an error similar to:

    error XA0032: Java SDK 11.0 or above is required when using Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0.0.
    

    ๐Ÿ— This error will be removed in a future version now that Xamarin.Android provides its own version of apksigner that is compatible with Java JDK 8. Relatedly, Android SDK Build-Tools version 30.0.2 and higher as provided by the Android SDK Manager are now also compatible with Java JDK 8.

    ๐Ÿ—„ Deprecation of Android Wear references in app projects

    ๐Ÿ— Referencing an Android Wear application project from an Android phone application project is now deprecated and will produce a build warning similar to:

    warning XA4312: Referencing the Android Wear application project 'com.contoso.wearapp' from an Android application project is deprecated and will no longer be supported in a future version of Xamarin.Android. Remove the Android Wear application project reference from the Android application project and distribute the Wear application as a standalone application instead.
    

    ๐Ÿšš To resolve this warning, remove the reference to Android Wear project from the phone application project and distribute the Android Wear project as a standalone Wear application instead.

    ๐Ÿ—„ Soft deprecation of undocumented ProguardConfigFiles MSBuild property

    Xamarin.Android's ProGuard compatibility feature included an undocumented ProguardConfigFiles MSBuild property that could be used as an alternative to the ProguardConfiguration Build Action. That ProguardConfigFiles property is now deprecated.

    Any project authors who are currently using the ProguardConfigFiles MSBuild property are encouraged to update to the ProguardConfiguration Build Action instead.

    For example, a .csproj file could contain a use of the ProguardConfiguration MSBuild property similar to the following:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<ProguardConfigFiles\> proguard1.cfg; proguard2.cfg; \</ProguardConfigFiles\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    To update a .csproj that contains a use of ProguardConfiguration like that, remove the ProguardConfiguration element from the .csproj file and instead set the proguard1.cfg and proguard2.cfg files to use the ProguardConfiguration Build Action. This adds the files as ProguardConfiguration items in the .csproj file:

    \<ItemGroup\> \<ProguardConfiguration Include="proguard1.cfg" /\> \<ProguardConfiguration Include="proguard2.cfg" /\> \</ItemGroup\>
    

    ๐Ÿ›  Issues fixed and other small changes

    ๐Ÿš€ Application and library build and deployment

    Developer Community 1086457: Changes to libraries referenced by the .NET Standard library in a standard Xamarin.Forms solution were not reflected in the running app without a clean rebuild. More generally, this issue affected any library referenced indirectly via a .NET Standard library that had the ProduceReferenceAssembly MSBuild property set to true.

    Developer Community 1120933: XABLD7019: System.UnauthorizedAccessException: Access to the path ... .lz4 is denied prevented projects from building successfully in the Release configuration if the managed linker was disabled in that configuration.

    โšก๏ธ Developer Community 1141659: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, the Updating Resources... build step could get stuck indefinitely if .DS_Store or any file starting with . was included in the project with the AndroidResource Build Action.

    โšก๏ธ Developer Community 1141659: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, the Updating Resources... build step could get stuck indefinitely if a NuGet package containing an AndroidResource file name starting with . was included in a project.

    Developer Community 1144021 and GitHub 4990: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, ADB0010: [INSTALL_FAILED_INVALID_APK: Failed to extract native libraries, res=-2] build error could prevent apps from being deployed after AndroidManifest.xml changes.

    Developer Community 1144910: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, errors similar to error APT2260: resource mipmap/ic_launcher (aka com.companyname.skiasharpsample:mipmap/ic_launcher) not found and error CS0117: 'Resource' does not contain a definition for 'Layout' could prevent building projects when maximum number of parallel project builds was set higher than one in the Visual Studio options or when the -m switch was used in command line MSBuild builds.

    Developer Community 1157593: Modifications to files set to use the AndroidAsset Build Action were not included as expected in incremental builds. Clean rebuilds were required to propagate the changes as expected.

    Developer Community 1182026: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, the Executing compile -o ... build step could get stuck indefinitely on certain systems where Environment.ProcessorCount returned 1.

    GitHub 1597: Marshaling of java.util.Map instances in files set to use the AndroidInterfaceDescription Build Action was incorrect.

    ๐Ÿ‘• GitHub 4565: Errors or warnings similar to Missing class: com.android.tools.lint.detector.api.Detector could appear unexpectedly in the build output of apps that referenced custom Xamarin.Android bindings libraries for .aar files.

    ๐Ÿ GitHub 4677: On Windows, running the InstallAndroidDependencies MSBuild target on the command line did not yet allow continuous build environments to install the Android SDK dependencies as expected.

    GitHub 4818: Projects that had the undocumented AndroidAotMode MSBuild property set to the experimental Hybrid value did not strip away the IL from the resulting managed assemblies as expected.

    ๐Ÿ”” GitHub PR 4824: No longer create NOTICE files in app packages.

    ๐Ÿš€ GitHub PR 4829: No longer fast deploy Android resources for the Assemblies:Dexes fast deployment mode.

    ๐Ÿ”Š GitHub PR 4984: Avoid logging the full contents of item lists in diagnostic MSBuild logs in cases where MSBuild conditions only need to check if the item lists are empty or non-empty.

    โšก๏ธ GitHub 4986: Updates to Android tooling (manifest-merger), caused //application/@android:extractNativeLibs to be set to "false" by default. This could cause an undesirable APK file size increase that was more noticeable for Xamarin.Android applications using AOT. Xamarin.Android now sets extractNativeLibs to "true" by default.

    GitHub 4998: Files under lib/ must have .so extension, found 'lib/x86/gdbserver'. build error prevented building app bundles for projects with references to Android C++ library projects.

    ๐Ÿ‘ GitHub 5024: error XA0119: Using the shared runtime and Android App Bundles at the same time is not currently supported build error could mistakenly appear for Xamarin.Android class libraries when the AndroidPackageFormat MSBuild property was set to aab.

    GitHub PR 5038: Errors similar to error APT2260: resource drawable/icon (aka com.contoso.androidapp:drawable/icon) not found could prevent building projects that were using ResizetizerNT and google-services.json together. The build system has now been updated to ensure each resource directory has its own unique cache file.

    ๐Ÿง GitHub 5043: i686-linux-android-ld.EXE: error: cannot open ... Debug\monoandroid10.0\android\typemaps.x86.o: No such file or directory could prevent building projects located under paths that contained .s.

    ๐Ÿ”‹ GitHub 5049: Starting in Visual Studio 2019 version 16.7, build errors similar to Feature 'XYZ' is not available in C# 7.3. Please use language version 8.0 or greater. could prevent projects from using C# 8.0 language features.

    Application behavior on device and emulator

    GitHub 4098: Exceptions similar to java.lang.ClassCastException: mono.android.runtime.JavaObject cannot be cast to float[] prevented passing certain C# types to some Android APIs.

    ๐Ÿ‘ป GitHub 4632: UNHANDLED EXCEPTION was shown unexpectedly in the application output in certain cases for handled exceptions that had been propagated through both Java and managed code.

    GitHub 4893: System.ArgumentNullException: Value cannot be null ... at Java.Interop.TypeManager.RegisterType (System.String java_class, System.Type t) could prevent launching apps on Android 9.0 Pie (API level 28) x86 emulators.

    GitHub 4989: Calling this.Dispose() from within a Java.Lang.Object.Dispose(bool) override threw a System.ArgumentException.

    Android API bindings

    • GitHub PR 5106: Bindings for overloads of Map.Of() that took more than fourteen parameters were not yet available.

    Bindings projects

    โš  GitHub 4956: warning MSB6002: The command-line for the "BindingsGenerator" task is too long could prevent building bindings library projects, most commonly when they referenced Xamarin.AndroidX NuGet packages.

    GitHub 5027: Syntax errors similar to ) expected could prevent building bindings projects after updating the Compile using Android version: (Target Framework) setting to Android 11 (R).

    โš  Java.Interop GitHub PR 672: For nested Java types that have protected visibility within sealed types, generate bindings that have private visibility to avoid C# warning CS0628.

    โš  Java.Interop GitHub 682: Ignorable warning BG8604: top ancestor ... not found for nested type ... appeared for public types nested under non-public types in Kotlin libraries. Those nested types are now skipped as expected.

    Java.Interop GitHub 694: Kotlin synthetic constructors were not yet ignored, resulting in unactionable error messages such as:

    Error while processing '[Constructor] MaterialDialog(android.content.Context p0, com.afollestad.materialdialogs.DialogBehavior p1, int p2, kotlin.jvm.internal.DefaultConstructorMarker p3)' in '[Class] com.afollestad.materialdialogs.MaterialDialog': Type 'kotlin.jvm.internal.DefaultConstructorMarker' was not found.
    

    Java.Interop GitHub 717: Error while processing type ... Type 'android.app.IntentService' was not found. prevented building bindings for libraries with classes that inherited from android.app.IntentService.

    Java.Interop GitHub 719: Bindings did not yet use GC.KeepAlive() calls to ensure that method arguments would never be garbage collected before they were passed to Java.

    Application publishing

    • โœ… GitHub 4949: The VtsVndkDependencyTest test from the Android Vendor Test Suite would not pass for Xamarin.Android apps installed into system ROMs by device vendors.

    Application Mono Framework behavior on device and emulator

    ๐Ÿš€ This version of Xamarin.Android updates the Mono 6.12 runtime and class libraries from Commit 83105ba2 to Commit be2226b5, adding 17 new commits.

    ๐Ÿ›  Fixes included for issues reported with Xamarin.Android applications:

    • Mono GitHub 8806: DWARF debugging symbols were incorrect for projects configured to use AOT Compilation with Use LLVM Optimizing Compiler.

    Thank you

    A big _ Thank You! _ to community members who contributed improvements in this release:

    Installing

    โšก๏ธ To get the new version in Visual Studio, update Visual Studio:

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    ๐Ÿ”– Versions for continuous build environments

    ๐ŸŽ For users installing Xamarin.Android on macOS continuous build environments, the corresponding version of the Mono Framework MDK to use is Mono Framework MDK 6.12.0.93.

    For special scenarios where users require Xamarin.Android SDK version 11.1.0.17 without any subsequent 11.1 servicing fixes, the fixed-version Visual Studio 2019 version 16.8.0 BuildTools installer can be used on Windows, and the fixed-version .pkg installer package can be used on macOS. The fixed-version .vsix installer package is another alternative for Windows.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 11.1 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories:

  • v11.1.0.15 Changes

    October 13, 2020

    October 13, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 11.1.0.15 was published as part of Visual Studio 2019 version 16.8 Preview 4 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.8 Preview 4.

    ๐Ÿš€ Corresponding Visual Studio 2019 Preview release notes

    What's new

    Corrected garbage collection behavior for Android bindings and bindings projects

    In previous Xamarin.Android versions, errors similar to JNI DETECTED ERROR IN APPLICATION: use of deleted global reference and JNI ERROR (app bug): attempt to use stale Global 0x2a2a (should be 0x2a26) could cause apps to abort under certain specific timing conditions where a managed garbage collection started just after a Java.Lang.Object subclass method call.

    ๐Ÿ— The Xamarin.Android bindings project build process now includes a fix for this issue.

    โšก๏ธ The set of Android API bindings that are included directly as part of the Xamarin.Android SDK have been updated accordingly to include the fix.

    Note: This fix will not solve the problem for other bindings libraries until the libraries are rebuilt using this new Xamarin.Android version. Bindings library authors are therefore encouraged to build and publish new versions of their libraries using this new Xamarin.Android version at their earliest convenience.

    ๐Ÿ›  Issues fixed

    ๐Ÿš€ Application and library build and deployment

    • โšก๏ธ Developer Community 1141659: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, the Updating Resources... build step could get stuck indefinitely if .DS_Store or any file starting with . was included in the project with the AndroidResource Build Action.
    • โšก๏ธ Developer Community 1141659: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, the Updating Resources... build step could get stuck indefinitely if a NuGet package containing an AndroidResource file name starting with . was included in a project.
    • Developer Community 1144910: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, errors similar to error APT2260: resource mipmap/ic_launcher (aka com.companyname.skiasharpsample:mipmap/ic_launcher) not found and error CS0117: 'Resource' does not contain a definition for 'Layout' could prevent building projects when maximum number of parallel project builds was set higher than one in the Visual Studio options or when the -m switch was used in command line MSBuild builds.
    • Developer Community 1182026: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, the Executing compile -o ... build step could get stuck indefinitely on certain systems where Environment.ProcessorCount returned 1.
    • ๐Ÿ GitHub 4677: On Windows, running the InstallAndroidDependencies MSBuild target on the command line did not yet allow continuous build environments to install the Android SDK dependencies as expected.
    • ๐Ÿง GitHub 5043: i686-linux-android-ld.EXE: error: cannot open ... Debug\monoandroid10.0\android\typemaps.x86.o: No such file or directory could prevent building projects located under paths that contained .s.

    Android API bindings

    • GitHub PR 5106: Bindings for overloads of Map.Of() that took more than fourteen parameters were not yet available.

    Bindings projects

    • GitHub 5027: Syntax errors similar to ) expected could prevent building bindings projects after updating the Compile using Android version: (Target Framework) setting to Android 11 (R).
    • โš  Java.Interop GitHub 682: Ignorable warning BG8604: top ancestor ... not found for nested type ... appeared for public types nested under non-public types in Kotlin libraries. Those nested types are now skipped as expected.
    • Java.Interop GitHub 717: Error while processing type ... Type 'android.app.IntentService' was not found. prevented building bindings for libraries with classes that inherited from android.app.IntentService.
    • Java.Interop GitHub 719: Bindings did not yet use GC.KeepAlive() calls to ensure that method arguments would never be garbage collected before they were passed to Java.

    Application Mono Framework behavior on device and emulator

    ๐Ÿš€ This version of Xamarin.Android updates the Mono 6.12 runtime and class libraries from Commit 83105ba2 to Commit be2226b5, adding 17 new commits.

    ๐Ÿ›  Fixes included for issues reported with Xamarin.Android applications:

    • Mono GitHub 8806: DWARF debugging symbols were incorrect for projects configured to use AOT Compilation with Use LLVM Optimizing Compiler.

    Installing

    โšก๏ธ To get the new version in Visual Studio, update Visual Studio:

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 11.1 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories:

  • v11.0.99.9 Changes

    August 05, 2020

    August 5, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 11.0.99.9 was published as part of Visual Studio 2019 version 16.8 Preview 1 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.8 Preview 1.

    ๐Ÿš€ Corresponding Visual Studio 2019 Preview release notes

    What's new

    ๐Ÿ—„ Soft deprecation of undocumented ProguardConfigFiles MSBuild property

    Since back when ProGuard compatibility was originally added to Xamarin.Android, the feature has included an undocumented ProguardConfigFiles MSBuild property that could be used as an alternative to the ProguardConfiguration Build Action.

    Any project authors who are currently using the ProguardConfigFiles MSBuild property are encouraged to update to the ProguardConfiguration Build Action instead.

    For example, a .csproj file could contain a use of the ProguardConfiguration MSBuild property similar to the following:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<ProguardConfigFiles\> proguard1.cfg; proguard2.cfg; \</ProguardConfigFiles\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    To update a .csproj that contains a use of ProguardConfiguration like that, remove the ProguardConfiguration element from the .csproj file and instead set the proguard1.cfg and proguard2.cfg to use the ProguardConfiguration Build Action. This adds the files as ProguardConfiguration items in the .csproj file:

    \<ItemGroup\> \<ProguardConfiguration Include="proguard1.cfg" /\> \<ProguardConfiguration Include="proguard2.cfg" /\> \</ItemGroup\>
    

    ๐Ÿ›  Issues fixed and other small changes

    ๐Ÿš€ Application and library build and deployment

    • GitHub 4818: Projects that had the undocumented AndroidAotMode MSBuild property set to the experimental Hybrid value did not strip away the IL from the resulting managed assemblies as expected.
    • ๐Ÿ”” GitHub PR 4824: No longer create NOTICE files in app packages.
    • ๐Ÿš€ GitHub PR 4829: No longer fast deploy Android resources for the Assemblies:Dexes fast deployment mode.

    Application behavior on device and emulator

    • GitHub 4098: Exceptions similar to java.lang.ClassCastException: mono.android.runtime.JavaObject cannot be cast to float[] prevented passing certain C# types to some Android APIs.
    • ๐Ÿ‘ป GitHub 4632: UNHANDLED EXCEPTION was shown unexpectedly in the application output in certain cases for handled exceptions that had been propagated through both Java and managed code.

    Bindings projects

    • โš  Java.Interop GitHub PR 672: Nested Java types with protected visibility within sealed types are now generated with private visibility, avoiding C# warning CS0628.

    Thank you

    A big _ Thank You! _ to community members who contributed improvements in this
    ๐Ÿš€ release:

    Installing

    โšก๏ธ To get the new version in Visual Studio, update Visual Studio:

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 11.1 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories:

  • v11.0.99.34 Changes

    August 26, 2020

    August 25, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 11.0.99.34 was published as part of Visual Studio 2019 version 16.8 Preview 2 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.8 Preview 2.

    What's new

    ๐Ÿš€ Build and deployment performance in Xamarin.Android 11.0.99.34

    ๐Ÿ— GitHub PR 4975: Cache the results of the FilterAssemblies MSBuild task in memory so they can be reused across different MSBuild targets during the build. This decreased incremental build times for the Xamarin.Forms source build from about 170 milliseconds to about 100 milliseconds on a test system. The savings will be bigger on larger solutions.

    ๐Ÿ—„ Deprecation of Android Wear references in app projects

    ๐Ÿ— Referencing an Android Wear application project from an Android phone application project is now deprecated and will produce a build warning similar to:

    warning XA4312: Referencing the Android Wear application project 'com.contoso.wearapp' from an Android application project is deprecated and will no longer be supported in a future version of Xamarin.Android. Remove the Android Wear application project reference from the Android application project and distribute the Wear application as a standalone application instead.
    

    ๐Ÿšš To resolve this warning, remove the reference to Android Wear project from the phone application project and distribute the Android Wear project as a standalone Wear application instead.

    ๐Ÿ›  Issues fixed and other small changes in Xamarin.Android 11.0.99.34

    ๐Ÿš€ Application and library build and deployment

    • Developer Community 1086457: Changes to libraries referenced by the .NET Standard library in a standard Xamarin.Forms solution were not reflected in the running app without a clean rebuild. More generally, this issue affected any library referenced indirectly via a .NET Standard library that had the ProduceReferenceAssembly MSBuild property set to true.
    • Developer Community 1120933: XABLD7019: System.UnauthorizedAccessException: Access to the path ... .lz4 is denied prevented projects from buidling successfully in the Release configuration if the managed linker was disabled in that configuration.
    • ๐Ÿ‘• GitHub 4565: Errors or warnings similar to Missing class: com.android.tools.lint.detector.api.Detector could appear unexpectedly in the build output of apps that referenced custom Xamarin.Android bindings libraries for .aar files.
    • ๐Ÿ”Š GitHub PR 4984: Avoid logging the full contents of item lists in diagnostic MSBuild logs in cases where MSBuild conditions only need to check if the item lists are empty or non-empty.

    Application behavior on device and emulator

    • GitHub 4893: System.ArgumentNullException: Value cannot be null ... at Java.Interop.TypeManager.RegisterType (System.String java_class, System.Type t) could prevent launching apps on Android 9.0 Pie (API level 28) x86 emulators.

    Bindings projects

    • โš  GitHub 4956: warning MSB6002: The command-line for the "BindingsGenerator" task is too long could prevent building bindings library projects, most commonly when they referenced Xamarin.AndroidX NuGet packages.

    Application publishing

    • โœ… GitHub 4949: The VtsVndkDependencyTest test from the Android Vendor Test Suite would not pass for Xamarin.Android apps installed into system ROMs by device vendors.

    Installing

    โšก๏ธ To get the new version in Visual Studio, update Visual Studio:

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 11.1 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories:

  • v11.0.2.0 Changes

    August 19, 2020

    August 18, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 11.0.2.0 was published as part of in Visual Studio 2019 version 16.7.2 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.7.3.

    ๐Ÿ›  Issues fixed in Xamarin.Android 11.0.2.0

    Application behavior on device and emulator

    • ๐Ÿšฆ Developer Community 1139203, GitHub 4983: Starting in Xamarin.Android 11.0, 'Could not load library: Library '/system/lib64/libmonodroid.so' not found.' ... Fatal signal 11 (SIGSEGV), code 1 (SEGV_MAPERR) prevented some application projects from launching successfully in certain build configurations.

    Installing

    โšก๏ธ To get the new version in Visual Studio, update Visual Studio:

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    ๐Ÿ”– Versions for continuous build environments

    ๐ŸŽ For users installing Xamarin.Android on macOS continuous build environments, the corresponding version of the Mono Framework MDK to use is Mono Framework MDK 6.12.0.89.

    For special scenarios where project authors require Xamarin.Android SDK version 11.0.2.0 without any subsequent 11.0 servicing fixes, the fixed-version Visual Studio 2019 version 16.7.2 BuildTools installer can be used on Windows and the fixed-version .pkg installer package can be used on macOS. The fixed-version .vsix installer package is another alternative for Windows.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 11.0 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories:

  • v11.0.0.3 Changes

    August 05, 2020

    August 5, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 11.0.0.3 was published as part of Visual Studio 2019 version 16.7 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.7.

    ๐Ÿš€ Corresponding Visual Studio 2019 release notes

    What's new compared to Xamarin.Android 10.3

    ๐Ÿ”ง Deprecations, removals, and default configuration changes

    ๐Ÿš€ Build and deployment performance

    • ๐Ÿ— GitHub PR 4190: Switch to running AAPT2 in single-file mode rather than --dir mode. This reduced the total incremental build time from about 16.4 seconds to about 5.5 seconds for a test project when a single Android resource file was changed between builds.
    • ๐Ÿ— GitHub PR 4750: Skip checking for uses of AppDomain.CreateDomain() in assemblies provided by Xamarin.Android. This reduced the time for the LinkAssembliesNoShrink from about 2.6 seconds to about 1.8 seconds for an initial clean build of small Xamarin.Forms test app.
    • โšก๏ธ Java.Interop GitHub PR 624, Java.Interop GitHub PR 627, Java.Interop GitHub PR 628: Update the CRC-64 algorithm used during builds to take advantage of a more efficient calculation technique. This reduced the total incremental build time from about 8.7 seconds to about 8.5 seconds for a small Xamarin.Forms app when one line of a C# file was changed between builds.

    ๐Ÿ“ฆ Smaller app package sizes

    ๐Ÿš€ Managed assemblies are now compressed by default for Release configuration builds, resulting in significantly smaller APK and Android App Bundle sizes. Assemblies are compressed with the LZ4 algorithm during builds and then decompressed on device during app startup.

    For a small example Xamarin.Forms application, this reduced the APK size from about 23 megabytes to about 17 megabytes while only increasing the time to display the first page of the app from about 780 milliseconds to about 790 milliseconds.

    If needed, the new behavior can be disabled for a particular project by opening the project file in Visual Studio or another text editor and setting the AndroidEnableAssemblyCompression MSBuild property to false in the .csproj file:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<AndroidEnableAssemblyCompression\>false\</AndroidEnableAssemblyCompression\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    Note: This feature is intended to replace the older Bundle assemblies into native code Visual Studio Enterprise feature for purposes of app size savings. The AndroidEnableAssemblyCompression property takes precedence if both features are enabled. Project authors who no longer need the Bundle assemblies into native code feature can now disable it or remove the BundleAssemblies MSBuild property from the .csproj file:

     \<PropertyGroup Condition=" '$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Release|AnyCPU' "\> \<DebugSymbols\>True\</DebugSymbols\> \<DebugType\>portable\</DebugType\> \<Optimize\>True\</Optimize\> \<OutputPath\>bin\Release\\</OutputPath\> \<DefineConstants\>TRACE\</DefineConstants\> \<ErrorReport\>prompt\</ErrorReport\> \<WarningLevel\>4\</WarningLevel\> \<AndroidManagedSymbols\>true\</AndroidManagedSymbols\> \<AndroidUseSharedRuntime\>False\</AndroidUseSharedRuntime\> \<AndroidLinkMode\>SdkOnly\</AndroidLinkMode\> \<EmbedAssembliesIntoApk\>True\</EmbedAssembliesIntoApk\>- \<BundleAssemblies\>true\</BundleAssemblies\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    Background information

    For comparison, for the small test Xamarin.Forms application with all target ABIs enabled, the Bundle assemblies into native code feature increases the APK size from about 23 megabytes to about 26 megabytes while increasing the time to display the first page of the app from about 780 milliseconds to about 850 milliseconds.

    If only one target ABI is enabled for the test application, such as arm64-v8a, the Bundle assemblies into native code feature decreases the APK size from around 16 megabytes to around 7.5 megabytes, while the new LZ4 approach decreases the size to around 8 megabytes. Time to display the first page is the same in this case as with all target ABIs enabled.

    The number of target ABIs affects the size comparison because Bundle assemblies into native code uses a separate copy of the compressed assemblies for each ABI, while the new LZ4 approach shares them across all target ABIs.

    Bindings for Android 11 Beta

    This version includes bindings for the Android 11 Beta from Google. See the Android 11 Beta documentation for additional information about the behavior and API changes in this new Android version. Because Android 11 Beta provides the finalized SDK and NDK APIs, the Xamarin.Android bindings are now also finalized and the Xamarin.Android SDK version number has been updated to 11.0. To use the bindings for the new APIs in a Xamarin.Android project, set Compile using Android version: (Target Framework) to Android 11 (R) under the Application tab of the Visual Studio project property pages. This sets the TargetFrameworkVersion property to v11.0 in the .csproj file:

    \<TargetFrameworkVersion\>v11.0\</TargetFrameworkVersion\>
    

    Note: The default and recommended Android SDK Build-Tools version for Xamarin.Android is still 29 because Build-Tools version 30.0 currently requires Java JDK 9 or higher, while both Xamarin.Android and Android Studio still require JDK 8. Android SDK Build-Tools 29 is compatible with the Android 11 bindings, so it is recommended to continue using Android SDK Build-Tools 29 for now.

    ๐Ÿ— Attempting to use Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0 with Java JDK 8 results in the following error:

    java.lang.UnsupportedClassVersionError: com/android/apksigner/ApkSignerTool has been compiled by a more recent version of the Java Runtime (class file version 53.0), this version of the Java Runtime only recognizes class file versions up to 52.0
    

    Project authors who wish to try Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0 can follow the steps under Preliminary Java JDK 11 compatibility to install and configure Java JDK 11.

    ๐Ÿ†• New features

    0๏ธโƒฃ These bindings take advantage of C# 8.0's support for default and static interface members to provide C# interface APIs that more closely match the original Android APIs.

    For example, in the Android.Views.TextClassifiers namespace, TextClassifier.HintTextIsEditable is now available as ITextClassifier.HintTextIsEditable, and the old TextClassifier.HintTextIsEditable field is marked [Obsolete].

    Note: An older set of bindings for interface constants were also available in Consts classes like TextClassifierConsts in earlier target framework versions. Those classes were marked [Obsolete] for several years. They have been removed completely for the Android 11 (R) target framework version. Project authors are encouraged to switch to the new interface members like ITextClassifier.HintTextIsEditable at their earliest convenience.

    Preliminary Java JDK 11 compatibility

    ๐Ÿ— Xamarin.Android can now use Java JDK 11 to build libraries and applications.

    ๐Ÿ— JDK 11 is not yet installed or required by default for Xamarin.Android, but the apksigner tool in Android SDK Build-Tools version 30 does require JDK 11, so project authors who are using the bindings for Android 11 Beta and want to experiment with setting the AndroidSdkBuildToolsVersion MSBuild property to version 30.0.0 or higher will need to use JDK 11.

    To do so:

    Install a distribution of JDK 11, such as JetBrains Runtime jbrsdk.

    On Windows, open Tools > Options in Visual Studio, select the Xamarin > Android Settings node, and set Java Development Kit Location to the root of the JDK 11 installation.

    On macOS, open Visual Studio > Preferences , select the Projects > SDK Locations > Android node, open the Locations tab, and set the Java SDK (JDK) Location to the root of the JDK 11 installation.

    ๐Ÿ”ง Alternatively, to configure the JDK path per project, open the project file in Visual Studio or another text editor and set the JavaSdkDirectory MSBuild property to the root of the JDK 11 installation. For example:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<JavaSdkDirectory\>C:\Program Files\jbrsdk\</JavaSdkDirectory\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    Note: The error that appears when attempting to use Android SDK Build-Tools 30.0 th Java JDK 8 is:

    java.lang.UnsupportedClassVersionError: com/android/apksigner/ApkSignerTool has been compiled by a more recent version of the Java Runtime (class file version 53.0), this version of the Java Runtime only recognizes class file versions up to 52.0
    

    Known Issues

    • GitHub 4789: error XACLP7004: System.ArgumentException: Directory ... obj\Debug\javadocs...' does not appear to be an android doc reference directory. prevents using the JavaSourceJar Build Action in bindings projects.

    Mono.Android nullable reference types compatibility

    The Mono.Android assembly has been annotated for compatibility with C# 8.0 nullable reference type checks. Projects can now optionally place code that uses types from Mono.Android in a nullable context to take advantage of additional compiler nullability checks. For example, to enable nullability checks for all code in a project, set the Nullable MSBuild property to enable in the .csproj file:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<Nullable\>enable\</Nullable\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    ๐Ÿ— When this property set, the build will emit warnings if any code does not properly account for possible null values passed into or returned from APIs in the Mono.Android assembly.

    ๐Ÿ“š See the nullable reference types documentation for more information.

    Note: The majority of Mono.Android, including the nullability annotations, is automatically generated from the Android Java source. The annotations intentionally preserve any upstream bugs in the nullability information provided by the Android source code.

    Tidier IntelliSense suggestions for Java.Lang.Object subclasses

    ๐Ÿ‘ Java.Lang.Object contains several properties and methods that are required to be public to support Xamarin.Android Java bindings but are not intended to be used in hand-written code. These members are now hidden from IntelliSense, making it easier to find the useful members.

    Example IntelliSense suggestions before and after

    ๐Ÿ‘ Bindings projects support for methods with more than 14 parameters

    ๐Ÿ‘ Xamarin.Android bindings projects now support binding Java methods that have any number of parameters instead of the previous limit of 14.

    Bindings projects enumeration enhancements

    The Transforms\EnumFields.xml file in bindings projects now allows <mapping> and <field> elements that use just clr-enum-type and clr-name attributes, with no jni-interface or jni-name attributes. This provides additional flexibility to define custom C# enumerations that are visible to the bindings generation process and do not correspond to any Java type in the bound Java library. For example:

    \<mapping clr-enum-type='Contoso.Permissions' bitfield='true'\> \<field clr-name='Read' value='0' /\> \<field clr-name='Write' value='1' /\> \<field clr-name='Execute' value='2' /\> \</mapping\>
    

    For enumerations that do correspond to Java types, project authors should continue to include the jni-interface and jni-name attributes as before.

    JI_JAVA_HOME environment variable for custom Java JDK paths

    Xamarin.Android will now look for the contents of an environment variable named JI_JAVA_HOME as another way to customize the Java JDK path used during the build. In cases where both the JI_JAVA_HOME environment variable and the JavaSdkDirectory MSBuild property are set to custom values, the MSBuild property takes precedence.

    In general, this environment does not need to be adjusted, but in certain special scenarios, having the option to customize the JDK path via an environment variable might provide useful flexibility.

    ๐Ÿ—„ XA1023 warning for upcoming DX DEX compiler deprecation

    Projects that have Dex compiler set to dx in the Visual Studio project property pages will now get a build warning:

    warning XA1023: Using the DX DEX Compiler is deprecated. Please update `$(AndroidDexTool)` to `d8`.
    

    To resolve this warning, set the Dex compiler in the Visual Studio project property pages to d8 or edit the project file in Visual Studio or another text editor and set the AndroidDexTool MSBuild property to d8:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<AndroidDexTool\>d8\</AndroidDexTool\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    Background information

    ๐Ÿš€ Google has deprecated the DX DEX compiler in favor of the D8 DEX compiler. After February 1, 2021, DX will no longer be a part of the Android SDK or Android Studio. Project authors are encouraged to migrate their projects to D8 at their earliest convenience to prepare for this change.

    โš  Other warning and error changes

    โšก๏ธ Updated XA0113 warning for Google Play submission requirements

    The XA0113 warning has been updated to reflect a more recent minimum target version of Android 9 (API level 28) for submissions to the Google Play store. The following warning will now appear for projects that have an earlier version set under Compile using Android version: (Target Framework) in the Visual Studio project property pages:

    warning XA0113: Google Play requires that new applications and updates must use a TargetFrameworkVersion of v9.0 (API level 28) or above. You are currently targeting v8.0 (API level 26).
    

    ๐Ÿ”ง XA0119 error for incompatible use of Android App Bundle format in Debug configuration

    ๐Ÿ“ฆ The Android App Bundle publishing format is not currently compatible with the recommended fast deployment settings for Debug configuration deployments. Previously, projects that had Android Package Format (AndroidPackageFormat) set to aab in the Debug configuration that also had the recommended Use Shared Runtime ( Use Shared Mono Runtime on macOS) setting enabled would produce a build warning and then fail to launch on device.

    ๐Ÿ”ง Because this configuration is not currently supported, Xamarin.Android now produces an error for it instead of a warning:

    error XA0119: Using the shared runtime and Android App Bundles at the same time is not currently supported. Use the shared runtime for Debug configurations and Android App Bundles for Release configurations.
    

    ๐Ÿ“ฆ To resolve this error, change the Android Package Format setting in the Visual Studio project property pages to apk for the Debug configuration. This corresponds to the apk value for the AndroidPackageFormat MSBuild property in the .csproj file:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<AndroidPackageFormat\>apk\</AndroidPackageFormat\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    ๐Ÿš€ This error is only relevant for Debug configuration builds. Release configuration builds can continue to use the Android App Bundle packaging format.

    ๐Ÿ—„ Bindings projects XA4231 warning for deprecated jar2xml parser

    ๐Ÿ— Any bindings project that has the AndroidClassParser MSBuild property set to the old jar2xml parser or any other unrecognized value will now get a XA4231 build warning:

    warning XA4231: The Android class parser 'jar2xml' is deprecated and will be removed in a future version of Xamarin.Android. Update the project properties to use 'class-parse' instead.
    

    ๐Ÿ“œ To resolve this warning, update the Android Class Parser setting in the Visual Studio project property pages or the .jar file parser setting in Visual Studio for Mac to class-parse. This corresponds to the class-parse value for the AndroidClassParser MSBuild property in the .csproj file:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<AndroidClassParser\>class-parse\</AndroidClassParser\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    ๐Ÿ—„ Bindings projects XA4232 warning for deprecated XamarinAndroid code generation target

    ๐Ÿ— Any bindings project that has the AndroidCodegenTarget MSBuild property set to the old XamarinAndroid code generation target or any other unrecognized value will now get a XA4232 build warning:

    warning XA4232: The Android code generation target value 'XamarinAndroid' is deprecated and will be removed in a future version of Xamarin.Android. Update the project properties to use 'XAJavaInterop1'.
    

    To resolve this warning, update the Android Codegen target setting in the Visual Studio project property pages or the Code generation target setting in Visual Studio for Mac to XAJavaInterop1. This corresponds to the XAJavaInterop1 value for the AndroidCodegenTarget MSBuild property in the .csproj file:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<AndroidCodegenTarget\>XAJavaInterop1\</AndroidCodegenTarget\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    โšก๏ธ Tool and library version updates

    โšก๏ธ D8 and R8 version update to 1.6.82

    โšก๏ธ The version of the D8 DEX compiler and R8 code shrinker included in Xamarin.Android has been updated from 1.5.68 to 1.6.82.

    โšก๏ธ bundletool version update to 0.14.0

    ๐Ÿš€ The version of the bundletool executable included in Xamarin.Android has been updated from 0.10.2 to 0.14.0, bringing in several improvements and bug fixes.

    โšก๏ธ AAPT2 version update to 4.0.0

    โšก๏ธ The version of the Android Asset Packaging Tool AAPT2 included in Xamarin.Android has been updated from 3.5.3 to 4.0.0.

    โšก๏ธ Manifest merger tool version update to 27.0.0

    ๐Ÿš€ The version of the manifest merger tool included in Xamarin.Android has been updated from 26.5.0 to 27.0.0.

    โšก๏ธ ProGuard version update to 6.2.2

    โšก๏ธ The version of ProGuard included in Xamarin.Android has been updated from 5.3.2 to 6.2.2, bringing in a number of improvements and bug fixes.

    Note: ProGuard is only relevant for projects configured to use the older DX DEX compiler. Project authors are recommended to update to the newer D8 DEX compiler at their earliest convenience.

    โšก๏ธ Mono.Data.Sqlite SQLite version update

    The version of SQLite used by Mono.Data.Sqlite in Xamarin.Android has been updated from 3.31.1 to 3.32.1, bringing in security fixes, improvements, and bug fixes.

    ๐Ÿ›  Issues fixed in Xamarin.Android 11.0.0.3

    ๐Ÿ— Design-time builds

    • โšก๏ธ Developer Community 896179, GitHub 4273: The IDE could become unresponsive for tens of seconds after changes were saved to an Android layout file in projects configured to use AAPT2.

    Application behavior on device and emulator

    • Developer Community 970610, Java.Interop GitHub 661: System.TypeLoadException: 'Could not load type 'Android.App.Application.IActivityLifecycleCallbacks' could cause apps using the Android 11 Developer Preview bindings to abort during startup.
    • Developer Community 1045818: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3 on Windows, errors similar to Java.Lang.RuntimeException: 'Font asset not found Fonts/fontello.ttf' could cause apps to abort unexpectedly on device after they were updated and redeployed from Visual Studio on Windows.
    • ๐Ÿ“œ Developer Community 1050379, GitHub 4795: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3, Unable to activate instance of type Android.Util.SparseArray`1[E] could cause apps built in the Debug configuration to abort.
    • โšก๏ธ GitHub 3784, GitHub 4471: An outdated version of the Mono Shared Runtime package was sometimes left on target development devices and emulators after Xamarin.Android version updates. This could result in unexpected behaviors in Debug configuration apps until the old shared runtime was manually uninstalled.
    • GitHub 4152: Unable to read profile ... The system cannot find the file specified prevented the FinishAotProfiling MSBuild target from completing successfully if the location of adb was not in the PATH environment variable.
    • GitHub 4542: error CS1681: You cannot redefine the global extern alias prevented building app projects successfully if the .csproj file included global in the <Aliases></Aliases> metadata element of a referenced Xamarin.Android class library.
    • GitHub PR 4589: ObjectDisposedException could in theory be thrown during cancellation of AndroidClientHandler requests, depending on the particular timing of cancellation and object disposal. The time window where this can happen is now narrower.
    • GitHub 4662: In projects configured to use the recently added manifestmerger.jar Android manifest merging option, tools:node="remove" did not yet remove AndroidManifest.xml nodes generated by C# attributes in referenced library projects.
    • GitHub 4772, GitHub 4852: System.DllNotFoundException: libmono-native.so assembly:<unknown assembly> type:<unknown type> member:(null) could cause apps to abort during startup on certain Android 5.0 Lollipop (API level 21) and Android 5.1 Lollipop (API level 22) devices.
    • โšก๏ธ GitHub PR 4779: error XA1011: Using ProGuard with the D8 DEX compiler is no longer supported. Please update $(AndroidLinkTool) to r8. did not mention the corresponding term code shrinker that is used in the Visual Studio project property pages and did not mention that AndroidLinkTool is an MSBuild property.
    • GitHub 4791: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3, many typemap: module matching MVID [...] not found. messages were logged to the application output for certain running apps, obscuring other logging statements of interest. These messages were diagnostic and did not indicate problems in the apps.
    • GitHub 4805: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3, localized resources from .resx files in Xamarin.Android application projects were no longer deployed when building and deploying from within Visual Studio to an attached device or emulator. In contrast, clean builds started on the command line worked as expected.
    • GitHub 4809: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3, System.MemberAccessException: Cannot create an instance of ... could cause apps built in the Debug configuration to abort when attempting to use certain APIs involving types that have both generic and non-generic versions such as Android.Widget.ArrayAdapter.
    • GitHub PR 4846: On Android 11 (API level 30) devices and emulators, java.lang.RuntimeException: Unable to get provider mono.MonoRuntimeProvider: java.lang.RuntimeException: Unable to find application Mono.Android.Platform.ApiLevel_30! caused apps to abort during startup for projects with the Target Android version set to API level 30 in the Android Manifest tab of the project property pages.

    ๐Ÿš€ Application and library build and deployment

    • ๐Ÿ”— Developer Community 1061307 Changes to files set to use the LinkDescription Build Action were not included as expected in incremental builds. Clean rebuilds were required to propagate the changes as expected.
    • Developer Community 1076396: DllImport error loading library '__Internal': 'Could not load library: Library '/system/lib64/libmonodroid.so' not found.' caused apps to abort during startup when built in an unsupported Debug configuration, with Android Package Format set to aab , because the build only provided a warning. The build now produces an error instead.
    • GitHub 2042: The Mono.Android assembly did not yet surface the nullability information provided by the upstream Android source code for use in C# 8.0 nullable contexts.
    • ๐Ÿš€ GitHub 4439: Invalid values of the AndroidDexTool MSBuild property produced a misleading error during deployment instead of an error during the build. Invalid values are now ignored and the default D8 DEX tool is used instead.
    • GitHub PR 4578: The source directory is under the output directory. Skip it. build error did not yet mention the relevant MSBuild item type or the current path of the invalid item.
    • GitHub PR 4640: System.ArgumentException: Illegal characters in path could prevent successful automatic detection of the Android SDK location during builds in some cases. One possible cause of this issue has now been addressed.
    • GitHub 4790: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3, errors similar to error XA3006: Could not compile native assembly file: typemaps.x86.s caused incremental builds to fail after changes to the Supported architectures (AndroidSupportedAbis) in the Advanced section of the Android Options tab in the project property pages.
    • ๐Ÿ“œ GitHub 4804: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3, Failed to parse APK info: failed to parse AndroidManifest.xml, error: %!s() prevented incremental deployments of certain projects that had references to libraries containing AndroidManifest.xml files.
    • โš  Java.Interop GitHub PR 622: warning : Failed to read ... with debugging symbols. Retrying to load it without it. and Mono.Cecil.Cil.SymbolsNotMatchingException: Symbols were found but are not matching the assembly could appear during builds, for example for projects using obfuscation tools. To align more closely with the behavior of other common .NET project types that do not warn about mismatched debugger symbols, Xamarin.Android projects now log these as informational messages instead of warnings.
    • For Android 11 (API level 30) emulators, failed to install Mono.Android.Platform.ApiLevel_30.apk:Failure [INSTALL_PARSE_FAILED_NO_CERTIFICATES: Scanning Failed.: No signature found in package of version 2 or newer for package Mono.Android.Platform.ApiLevel_30] prevented deploying successfully in the Debug configuration with the shared runtime enabled, which is the recommended default.

    Application Mono Framework behavior on device and emulator

    ๐Ÿš€ This version of Xamarin.Android updates the Mono 6.12 runtime and class libraries from Commit 165f4b03 to Commit 83105ba2, adding 21 new commits.

    ๐Ÿ›  Fixes included for issues reported with Xamarin.Android applications:

    • Developer Community 952568, Mono GitHub 18865: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.2, SslStream.BeginRead() and SslStream.BeginWrite() would block if called at the same time.
    • GitHub 4713: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3, SIGSEGV during monodroid_typemap_java_to_managed could cause apps to abort if the application was built with the AndroidEnablePreloadAssemblies MSBuild property set to false.
    • GitHub 4817: * Assertion at ... mono/mini/method-to-ir.c:12332, condition `var->opcode == OP_REGOFFSET' not met caused apps to abort in the Release configuration when attempting to use the new() type constraint in combination with the XElement type.

    IDE compatibility

    • GitHub 4582: Some Java.Lang.Object properties and methods like Handle and PeerReference appeared in IntelliSense suggestions even though they were primarily intended for use only in generated code.
    • ๐Ÿ— GitHub 4675: The project ... is missing Android SDKs required for building. prevented building without the Android NDK installed for projects with Enable Startup Tracing or AOT Compilation enabled.

    Android API bindings

    • ๐Ÿ‘ GitHub 4752: error XAGJS7004: System.ArgumentException: Unsupported ForegroundServiceType value '9'. prevented using bitwise combinations of multiple values of Android.Content.PM.ForegroundService.

    Bindings projects

    • GitHub PR 4579: Unrecognized transform root element build error did not yet mention the relevant MSBuild item type.
    • GitHub PR 4579: Specified source jar not found and Specified reference jar not found build errors did not yet mention Java library types other than JAR files.
    • Java.Interop GitHub 515: Bindings projects did not yet have a convenient way to add C# enumerations that did not correspond to Java types.
    • โš  Java.Interop GitHub 588: Warnings similar to warning BG8503: Invalidating Java.Util.IMap and all nested types because some of its methods were invalid. could prevent the bindings generator from providing bindings for interfaces even when the invalid methods were all marked static. Because classes are not required to implement static methods from Java interfaces, the bindings generator now ignores invalid static methods and continues generating bindings for interfaces in these cases.
    • ๐Ÿ— Java.Interop GitHub PR 611: Building a binding project that had a reference to another binding project performed some redundant work for assemblies referenced by both projects.
    • ๐Ÿ‘ Java.Interop GitHub 631: Xamarin.Android bindings projects did not yet support binding Java methods with more than 14 parameters.
    • โš  Java.Interop GitHub PR 651: Unactionable warning : class-parse: warning: method ... Local variables array has 0 entries ... descriptor has 1 entries! prevented the bindings generator from detecting parameter names for constructor methods marked with the Kotlin @JvmOverloads annotation.

    Thank you

    A big _ Thank You! _ to community members who contributed improvements in this release:

    Installing

    โšก๏ธ To get the new version in Visual Studio, update Visual Studio:

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    ๐Ÿ”– Versions for continuous build environments

    ๐ŸŽ For users installing Xamarin.Android on macOS continuous build environments, the corresponding version of the Mono Framework MDK to use is Mono Framework MDK 6.12.0.89.

    For special scenarios where users require Xamarin.Android SDK version 11.0.0.3 without any subsequent 11.0 servicing fixes, the fixed-version Visual Studio 2019 version 16.7.0 BuildTools installer can be used on Windows, and the fixed-version .pkg installer package can be used on macOS. The fixed-version .vsix installer package is another alternative for Windows.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 11.0 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories:

  • v10.4.0.0 Changes

    June 23, 2020

    June 23, 2020 โ€” Xamarin.Android 10.4.0.0 was published as part of Visual Studio 2019 version 16.7 Preview 3 and Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.7 Preview 3.

    ๐Ÿš€ Corresponding Visual Studio 2019 Preview release notes

    In Xamarin.Android 10.4.0.0

    ๐Ÿ”ง Deprecations, removals, and default configuration changes

    ๐Ÿš€ Build and deployment performance

    • ๐Ÿ— GitHub PR 4750: Skip checking for uses of AppDomain.CreateDomain() in assemblies provided by Xamarin.Android. This reduced the time for the LinkAssembliesNoShrink from about 2.6 seconds to about 1.8 seconds for an initial clean build of small Xamarin.Forms test app.

    ๐Ÿ“ฆ Smaller app package sizes

    ๐Ÿš€ Managed assemblies are now compressed by default for Release configuration builds, resulting in significantly smaller APK and Android App Bundle sizes. Assemblies are compressed with the LZ4 algorithm during builds and then decompressed on device during app startup.

    For a small example Xamarin.Forms application, this reduced the APK size from about 23 megabytes to about 17 megabytes while only increasing the time to display the first page of the app from about 780 milliseconds to about 790 milliseconds.

    If needed, the new behavior can be disabled for a particular project by opening the project file in Visual Studio or another text editor and setting the AndroidEnableAssemblyCompression MSBuild property to false in the .csproj file:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<AndroidEnableAssemblyCompression\>false\</AndroidEnableAssemblyCompression\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    Note: This feature is intended to replace the older Bundle assemblies into native code Visual Studio Enterprise feature for purposes of app size savings. The AndroidEnableAssemblyCompression property takes precedence if both features are enabled. Project authors who no longer need the Bundle assemblies into native code feature can now disable it or remove the BundleAssemblies MSBuild property from the .csproj file:

     \<PropertyGroup Condition=" '$(Configuration)|$(Platform)' == 'Release|AnyCPU' "\> \<DebugSymbols\>True\</DebugSymbols\> \<DebugType\>portable\</DebugType\> \<Optimize\>True\</Optimize\> \<OutputPath\>bin\Release\\</OutputPath\> \<DefineConstants\>TRACE\</DefineConstants\> \<ErrorReport\>prompt\</ErrorReport\> \<WarningLevel\>4\</WarningLevel\> \<AndroidManagedSymbols\>true\</AndroidManagedSymbols\> \<AndroidUseSharedRuntime\>False\</AndroidUseSharedRuntime\> \<AndroidLinkMode\>SdkOnly\</AndroidLinkMode\> \<EmbedAssembliesIntoApk\>True\</EmbedAssembliesIntoApk\>- \<BundleAssemblies\>true\</BundleAssemblies\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    Background information

    For comparison, for the small test Xamarin.Forms application with all target ABIs enabled, the Bundle assemblies into native code feature increases the APK size from about 23 megabytes to about 26 megabytes while increasing the time to display the first page of the app from about 780 milliseconds to about 850 milliseconds.

    If only one target ABI is enabled for the test application, such as arm64-v8a, the Bundle assemblies into native code feature decreases the APK size from around 16 megabytes to around 7.5 megabytes, while the new LZ4 approach decreases the size to around 8 megabytes. Time to display the first page is the same in this case as with all target ABIs enabled.

    The number of target ABIs affects the size comparison because Bundle assemblies into native code uses a separate copy of the compressed assemblies for each ABI, while the new LZ4 approach shares them across all target ABIs.

    Minimum compatible Android version changed back to Android 4.4 KitKat (API level 19)

    ๐Ÿ‘ The minimum compatible Android version for Xamarin.Android apps has been changed back to Android Android 4.4 KitKat (API level 19) to align more closely with the Xamarin.Forms supported platforms.

    ๐Ÿš€ This reverts the change from the previous preview that updated the minimum compatible version to Android 5.0 Lollipop.

    Enumerations for new constants in Android 11 Developer Preview 4

    ๐Ÿš€ The preview bindings for Android 11 Developer Preview 4 now provide strongly typed enumerations for new constants that are part of Android 11.

    Preliminary Java JDK 11 compatibility

    ๐Ÿ— Xamarin.Android can now use Java JDK 11 to build libraries and applications.

    ๐Ÿ— JDK 11 is not yet installed or required by default for Xamarin.Android, but the apksigner tool in Android SDK Build-Tools version 30 does require JDK 11, so project authors who are using the preview bindings for Android 11 Developer Preview 4 and want to experiment with setting the AndroidSdkBuildToolsVersion MSBuild property to version 30.0.0 will need to use JDK 11.

    To do so:

    Install a distribution of JDK 11 version 11.0.4 or lower, such as JetBrains Runtime jbrsdk build 520.13 or earlier.

    On Windows, open Tools > Options in Visual Studio, select the Xamarin > Android Settings node, and set Java Development Kit Location to the root of the JDK 11 installation.

    On macOS, open Visual Studio > Preferences , select the Projects > SDK Locations > Android node, open the Locations tab, and set the Java SDK (JDK) Location to the root of the JDK 11 installation.

    ๐Ÿ”ง Alternatively, to configure the JDK path per project, open the project file in Visual Studio or another text editor and set the JavaSdkDirectory MSBuild property to the root of the JDK 11 installation. For example:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<JavaSdkDirectory\>C:\Program Files\jbrsdk\</JavaSdkDirectory\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    Known Issues

    • GitHub 4789: error XACLP7004: System.ArgumentException: Directory ... obj\Debug\javadocs...' does not appear to be an android doc reference directory. prevents using the JavaSourceJar Build Action in bindings projects.
    • ๐Ÿ— GitHub 4853: error XA0030: Building with JDK version 11.0.7 is not supported. prevents using the latest available OpenJDK 11 version, such as the latest build of the JetBrains Runtime.

    ๐Ÿ—„ XA1023 warning for upcoming DX DEX compiler deprecation

    Projects that have Dex compiler set to dx in the Visual Studio project property pages will now get a build warning:

    warning XA1023: Using the DX DEX Compiler is deprecated. Please update `$(AndroidDexTool)` to `d8`.
    

    To resolve this warning, set the Dex compiler in the Visual Studio project property pages to d8 , or edit the project file in Visual Studio or another text editor and set the AndroidDexTool MSBuild property to d8:

    \<PropertyGroup\> \<AndroidDexTool\>d8\</AndroidDexTool\> \</PropertyGroup\>
    

    Background information

    ๐Ÿš€ Google has deprecated the DX DEX compiler in favor of the D8 DEX compiler. After February 1, 2021, DX will no longer be a part of the Android SDK or Android Studio. Project authors are encouraged to migrate their projects to D8 at their earliest convenience to prepare for this change.

    โšก๏ธ Updated XA0113 warning for Google Play submission requirements

    The XA0113 warning has been updated to reflect the current minimum target version of Android 9 (API level 28) for submissions to the Google Play store. The following warning will now appear for projects that have an earlier version set under Compile using Android version: (Target Framework) in the Visual Studio project properties pages:

    warning XA0113: Google Play requires that new applications and updates must use a TargetFrameworkVersion of v9.0 (API level 28) or above. You are currently targeting v8.0 (API level 26).
    

    โšก๏ธ Mono.Data.Sqlite SQLite version update

    The version of SQLite used by Mono.Data.Sqlite in Xamarin.Android has been updated from 3.31.1 to 3.32.1, bringing in security fixes, improvements, and bug fixes.

    JI_JAVA_HOME environment variable for custom Java JDK paths

    Xamarin.Android will now look for the contents of an environment variable named JI_JAVA_HOME as another way to customize the Java JDK path used during the build. In cases where both the JI_JAVA_HOME environment variable and the JavaSdkDirectory MSBuild property are set to custom values, the MSBuild property takes precedence.

    In general, this environment does not need to be adjusted, but in certain special scenarios, having the option to customize the JDK path via an environment variable might provide useful flexibility.

    ๐Ÿ›  Issues fixed

    IDE compatibility

    • ๐Ÿ— Developer Community 1038779: Starting in Visual Studio 2019 version 16.7 Preview 1, Visual Studio would abort unexpectedly when attempting to load or build certain Xamarin.Android projects configured to use AAPT2.

    Application behavior on device and emulator

    • Developer Community 1021788, GitHub 4727: Many typemap: unable to find mapping to a Java type from managed type messages were logged to the application output for running apps, in some cases causing Visual Studio to become unresponsive until the output window caught up. This issue was also fixed in Xamarin.Android 10.3.1.4.
    • Developer Community 1030901, GitHub 4664: Localized resources from .resx files were not deployed when building and deploying from within Visual Studio to an attached device or emulator. (In contrast, clean builds on the command line worked as expected.) This issue was also fixed in Xamarin.Android 10.3.1.4.

    ๐Ÿš€ Application and library build and deployment

    • Developer Community 955972 error APT2258: not well-formed (invalid token) prevented using accented characters or other non-ASCII UTF-8 characters in Android layout files that also contained custom views. This issue was also fixed in Xamarin.Android 10.3.1.4.
    • GitHub 4152: Unable to read profile ... The system cannot find the file specified prevented the FinishAotProfiling MSBuild target from completing successfully if the location of adb was not in the PATH environment variable.
    • GitHub 4542: error CS1681: You cannot redefine the global extern alias prevented building app projects successfully if the .csproj file included global in the <Aliases></Aliases> metadata element of a referenced Xamarin.Android class library.
    • GitHub 4662: In projects configured to use the recently added manifestmerger.jar Android manifest merging option, tools:node="remove" did not yet remove AndroidManifest.xml nodes generated by C# attributes in referenced library projects.
    • โšก๏ธ GitHub PR 4779: error XA1011: Using ProGuard with the D8 DEX compiler is no longer supported. Please update $(AndroidLinkTool) to r8. did not mention the corresponding term code shrinker that is used in the Visual Studio project property pages and did not mention that AndroidLinkTool is an MSBuild property.

    Android API bindings

    • ๐Ÿ‘ GitHub 4752: error XAGJS7004: System.ArgumentException: Unsupported ForegroundServiceType value '9'. prevented using bitwise combinations of multiple values of Android.Content.PM.ForegroundService.

    Application Mono Framework behavior on device and emulator

    ๐Ÿš€ This version of Xamarin.Android updates the Mono 6.12 runtime and class libraries from Commit 075c3f06 to Commit 87ef5557, adding 5 new commits.

    • GitHub 4713: Starting in Xamarin.Android 10.3, SIGSEGV during monodroid_typemap_java_to_managed could cause apps to abort if the application was built with the AndroidEnablePreloadAssemblies MSBuild property set to false.

    Installing

    โšก๏ธ To get the new version in Visual Studio, update Visual Studio:

    For other scenarios, the latest commercial .vsix and .pkg installer packages can be found in the project README.

    Open source

    Xamarin.Android 10.4 is based on the open-source Xamarin.Android repositories: