Your C# App on 66 Million Macs: Announcing Xamarin.Mac

While I wouldn't shed any tears to see Java disappear from the desktop, it has a massive presence in the Enterprise and that is not due to large deployments of Macs.

Re: Your C# App on 66 Million Macs: Announcing Xamarin.Mac

#5

Post by colkassad » Wed, Dec 12, 2012, 5:44 PM UTC

LaSombra wrote: post #2

This might be the final blow to Java on the desktop.

At a $1,000 a license? I don't think so.

Re: Your C# App on 66 Million Macs: Announcing Xamarin.Mac

#6

Post by jbigelow76 » Wed, Dec 12, 2012, 5:45 PM UTC

Xamarin does some impressive work. They are becoming to C# what PhoneGap is to Javascript/HTML (license fee not withstanding).

Re: Your C# App on 66 Million Macs: Announcing Xamarin.Mac

#7

Post by TheEskimo » Wed, Dec 12, 2012, 5:49 PM UTC

LaSombra wrote: post #2

This might be the final blow to Java on the desktop.

Not at all. This offers a completely different solution than java. With java, you write once and run on everything. This lets you write C# on OS X, but it won't compile and run on Windows or Linux. Windows software can't be as easily ported to OS X either, the entire GUI, at the least, will have to be rewritten.

I would argue that Python would make more sense as a java-killer. It has the write once, run everywhere thing down much better (though still not good enough) than this.

Java is not going anywhere, sadly, and the linked product does not offer a compelling reason to believe that it will kill anything. All I see happening is that people who use mono now will potentially switch to this; honestly this isn't really ground breaking.

Re: Your C# App on 66 Million Macs: Announcing Xamarin.Mac

#8

Post by untog » Wed, Dec 12, 2012, 5:51 PM UTC

LaSombra wrote: post #2

This might be the final blow to Java on the desktop.

It costs $399 for an individual license, so there is a cost barrier. I balked at the cost of MonoTouch, but since playing around with it, I've got to say- I think it'll be worth the money. I just wish it was a little more affordable to hobbyist developers like myself.

EDIT: I just noticed that they had a 25% Black Friday offer. Damn.

Re: Your C# App on 66 Million Macs: Announcing Xamarin.Mac

#9

Post by natfriedman » Wed, Dec 12, 2012, 5:56 PM UTC

TheEskimo wrote: post #7

LaSombra wrote: post #2

This might be the final blow to Java on the desktop.

Not at all. This offers a completely different solution than java. With java, you write once and run on everything. This lets you write C# on OS X, but it won't compile and run on Windows or Linux. Windows software can't be as easily ported to OS X either, the entire GUI, at the least, will have to be rewritten. I would argue that Python would make more sense as a java-killer. It has the write once, run everywhere th…

Yes, but write-once-run-anywhere solutions deliver mediocre user experiences on every platform. You don't want your Mac app to look anything like your Windows 8 app. With Xamarin you separate the presentation layer of your app from the rest of the app, and the only thing you're rewriting from platform to platform is the UI. Typically this is only about 25% of the code (though of course it can vary). This is how our customers do it on Android, iOS and Windows, and now they can extend their apps to Mac and still deliver an amazing Mac app.

Re: Your C# App on 66 Million Macs: Announcing Xamarin.Mac

#10

Post by natfriedman » Wed, Dec 12, 2012, 5:58 PM UTC

untog wrote: post #8

LaSombra wrote: post #2

This might be the final blow to Java on the desktop.

It costs $399 for an individual license, so there is a cost barrier. I balked at the cost of MonoTouch, but since playing around with it, I've got to say- I think it'll be worth the money. I just wish it was a little more affordable to hobbyist developers like myself. EDIT: I just noticed that they had a 25% Black Friday offer. Damn.

Thanks for the feedback. We definitely have two classes of customers - businesses and professional developers who can't believe how cheap our products are relative to the value they're receiving, and hobbyists who are more price-sensitive. It's tricky to balance these two.