So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish; Xamarin End of Support
I am writing this at 2 AM so there will certainly be some emotions involved, but this blog post needs to be written.
Yesterday it was the 1st of May, 2024, and the Xamarin reached the end of its life (support), with a short message:
Xamarin support ended on May 1, 2024 for all Xamarin SDKs including Xamarin.Forms.
... and the public repository has been archived forever.
To be honest, this was announced way back, enough months ago, but this happening triggered some emotions in me.
I am writing this because the Xamarin project and the whole community around it greatly impacted my professional and private life.
Through the last 8 years, I delivered more than 30 Xamarin-related sessions and workshops and answered a lot of questions about it, I can proudly say that I spread a huge amount of word regarding Xamarin... and back in 2018, I made also a couple of code contributions to Xamarin.Forms.
And now, the code written by me will always stay there, sealed and archived, resting and living inside thousands of mobile apps.
I will always remember the first time my PR was approved, and how I felt when my code was merged into the Xamarin.Forms project. Those moments are for life! ❤️
For the first time, I started playing with Xamarin back in 2016, and after a few lines of code, I fell in love, which led to the fact that this platform will always be in my heart ❤️
Through this journey I had a chance to meet and hang out with some of the greatest people I know, I contributed to the Xamarin.Forms project, I have written a lot of Xamarin content on my blog, I spoke at Xamarin Expert Day events a couple of times.
And one of my favourite photos ever was taken at Xamarin Expert Day in Cologne.
... more speaking engagements here:
... and there a lot of more and a huge bucket of great memories and events related to Xamarin!
Now what comes next?
Microsoft now has .NET MAUI and a new project and I want to see them succeed with it. If you did not check it out, you should definitely!
In short words, .NET MAUI is:
Multi-platform
.NET MAUI uses the latest technologies for building native apps on Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android, abstracting them into one common framework built on .NET.
One codebase
Use a single C# codebase and project system for all device targets to build apps that look and feel like the native platforms.
Productive
Build beautiful apps faster and easier by integrating the power of Visual Studio with .NET MAUI.
... and regarding me, I will continue to play with .NET MAUI, and mobile apps as a side project for now.
Currently, I am working as a Lead Architect at run.events GmbH, where my daily work is not much related to the mobile side.
But you can expect here to read content about .NET MAUI or mobile development from time to time.
Regarding the mobile dev, in my free time, I am working on my own workshop regarding mobile development and it will be based on different mobile frameworks including the .NET MAUI.
Thank you, Xamarin! 💙
I am sad to see Xamarin going away, but I am confident that the .NET MAUI team will do their best to keep this .NET mobile story going with the MAUI project.
I am sad to see Xamarin reaching the end since it had a huge impact on my career, my private life, my connections, the stories which are written, the friends which are made, and the best community in the world this framework had!
I will always remember the "old days" and the old version of Xamarin, all the interactions we had on Twitter, and at the events... I will always remember Xamarin University, Planet Xamarin... and the best team working on it...
... in other words, this special framework will always be in my heart!
So Long, and Thanks for All the Fish, Xamarin! 💙
... Requiescat in pace, my friend Xamarin 💌