Uno platform has unveiled Hot Design, a visual designer for .NET applications, as part of a suite named Uno Platform Studio. It allows developers and designers to design the app interface at runtime instead of design and development time.
Jerome Laban (Uno Platform CTO) and Nick Randolph (lead engineer, Uno Platform) presented the new suite of tools, Uno Platform Studio, during the .NET Conference. The new suite of tools is made of three tools:
- Hot Design, a runtime visual designer application
- Hot Reload, a code update tool
- Design-to-Code, a Figma plugin that generates clean XAML and C# code from design prototypes
Hot Design screenshot, running on a live application in Visual Studio (from Uno Platform blog)
Hot Design is applied at runtime for debug builds. It presents a toolbar similar to the one for Windows .NET UI applications, overlaid on the application window. Upon clicking the Hot Design button, the application window transforms into a full designer, with a toolbox on the left and a property pane on the right. The developer can select controls in the app or add new ones. The selected control can be modified live by dragging, resizing or changing the properties in the property pane. The app can be resumed while in Hot Design to test the changes or paused to make new changes.
The most significant difference with other visual designers for .NET or other platforms is that the designer is created around a running application, not simulated or mocked. It exposes actual data and property bindings, simplifying and shortening the developer code cycle. The designer supports any .NET editor and operating system where .NET apps run. This means Visual Studio, Visual Studio Code, and JetBrains Rider running on Windows, macOS, iOS, and Linux, at least for now.
Hot Design running on a live iOS app (from Uno Platform blog)
In recent years, the lack of a good visual designer has hampered Windows desktop and cross-platform application developers. In August, Microsoft collected feedback for the WinUI platform, and designer deficiencies were among the top concerns. When asked about this developer hurdle, Sasha Krsmanovic, Uno Platform CMO, said:
Hot Design greatly simplifies the creation of apps on any platform, including Windows. The lack of WinUI designer is seen as major obstacle for building Windows applications with WinUI and .NET. With Hot Design all those limitations go away.
Developers on social media seem to welcome the new tool, which is only available as a preview right now. One developer, Sébastien Lachance, stated about the designer:
It’s remarkable to have the app running within the designer. The Form Factor feature will be super appreciated by the mobile developers.
Uno platform is an alternative UI platform for building multi-device applications in C# and XAML. It was launched in 2018 after years of internal use by a Canadian company nventive. It allows developers to write applications for Windows, iOS, Android, WebAssembly, macOS and Linux. Internally, it uses the target platform to keep the compiled code as native as possible (WinUI, Mac iOS UI Kit or Android views) while using a single set of XAML and C# Uno code. In the case of Linux desktop apps, it falls back to Skia 2D rendering of the controls, as Avalonia UI does. It is released under Apache 2.0 open-source license on GitHub.
The future plans for the Hot Design tool will include style editing and animations, according to the Uno Platform founder François Tanguay. Right now, the access to the new tools is with a waitlist sign-up for developers.
