Exploring Visual Studio for Mac: Installation, Features, and First Impressions
This article walks through the acquisition of Xamarin by Microsoft, the integration of Xamarin Studio into Visual Studio for Mac, provides step‑by‑step installation instructions, highlights the new project templates—including .NET Core and cross‑platform solutions—and shares early impressions of the IDE’s potential for mobile development.
At Connect 2016 the author was excited about Visual Studio 2017 debugging on Docker, MS SQL on Linux, Azure Functions, and many other technologies, but was especially interested in the newly announced Visual Studio for Mac.
Microsoft acquired Xamarin eight months earlier and integrated Xamarin’s IDE into Visual Studio for Mac, effectively rebranding Xamarin Studio. This move is part of a long‑term strategy, potentially paving the way for a 64‑bit Visual Studio on Windows and even a future Visual Studio on Linux.
The author provides a direct download link for the Visual Studio for Mac DMG (about 22 MB) and describes opening the DMG, double‑clicking the installer, accepting the license agreement, and proceeding through the installation screens (images shown).
Visual Studio for Mac Preview is version 7.0.0, built on Xamarin Studio 7.0.0. It includes newer versions of Xamarin.iOS and Xamarin.Android, as well as the officially released Xamarin Workbooks. The installation can take around 40 minutes, especially due to Android SDK downloads.
After installation, the author notes that the UI feels simpler compared to the traditional Windows Visual Studio.
The next step is exploring project templates. Besides the classic iOS, Android, Mac, and tvOS templates, the IDE now offers .NET Core and a cross‑platform cloud‑enabled solution, aligning well with Microsoft’s broader ecosystem.
The author tried the “Connected” template, which scaffolds a full stack solution from backend to frontend, and suggests that it should support not only Azure but also AWS and Google Cloud for broader deployment options.
Overall, the first hands‑on experience with Visual Studio for Mac was positive; while it still resembles Xamarin Studio, its future looks promising, potentially influencing the architecture of Visual Studio on Windows and even leading to a Visual Studio for Linux.
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