Hello,
Allow me to highlight Martin Maat's posting about
diving into XAML and trying out Xamlon and MyXAML.
Martin writes:
For the last couple of days I have been trying to get
started with XAML and I am having mixed feelings so
far. I first want to share my experiences and then ask
a specific question.
A couple of months ago I first read about Xamlon and
thought it would be worth while to check out. When I
was finally ready to do so, having an application in
mind, I looked a bit further and found MyXaml and
wanted to know the differences upfront in order to
make the right choice, not willing to learn both. I
learned that Xamlon targeted Longhorn, with the
ambition to
be as close to the final Longhorn XAML as possible
once that would be released. Fine, that was basically
what I was after. Then I read about MyXaml, which had
some smart-ass author that was critsizing the Avalon
team for most everything they were doing on the XAML
front. His MyXaml would be much cleaner, better, blah
blah, et cetera... Well, it didn't seem unreasonable
but since my first aim was to prepare for Longhorn, I
chose Xamlon.
After a day and a half of sheer agony I removed Xamlon
and installed MyXaml after all which, up until now,
leaves a far better impression. I will present the
biggest drawbacks of Xamlon as I experienced them.
"Not to bash you guys, I just want you to do better"
(that's what the MyXaml guy says to the Avalon team
all the time, I like that approach).
- It "messes up" the .NET namepaces, inserting all
sorts of extra bits, particularly in
System.Windows.Forms. Pretty indiscrete. It installs a
ton of assemblies, creating name clashes and
ambiguities with existing .NET classes.
- It has this wizard/plug-in that sets up your
application which is nice, the first time, but then it
won't let go. It re-applies that script every time you
compile, ruining every modification you made. It has
ideas about how to distribute code over files and what
to name classes and objects (and files). "You want to
change that? Ha! We laugh in your face. We'll take
care of that for you! Again and again and again..."
Well, not anymore, it's gone now.
- it is just not half finished, 0.9 beta 5 is
suggesting way more then it delivers. For instance, it
inserts pointless C# code like
<property> = null;
in the initialization section of the form that causes
the application to blow up. You have to remove it
first. A moment later the line is added again. It
doesn't get more annoying than that.
- it has some controls which suggest they enable you
to embed XAML into your own app. I remember
ElementHost. If you use that and work your way against
the plug-in grain towards compilation and manage to
run the app, it blows up at run-time complaining you
need to use some other control first. Oh, by the way,
these components are not installed by the installer, I
had to browse to them and add them to the toolbox
myself. It said something about frames, I tried the
frame and it gave me some other error at runtime
leaving me guessing what I was doing wrong.
Well, don't I read the documentation? Am I just going
by trial and error here and expect things to work?
Yes, because there is no documentation. It does have
shortcuts to what should be on-line documentation but
the page is empty. It says something like "coming
soon". We have all seen that before.
Finally, the de-installer doesn't work. It does take
out the assembly registrations from the GAC (good
thing!) but the files under Program Files are left
untouched. Okay, i can take care of that...
Xamlon just did not seem targeted at the developer at
all. So I went for MyXaml, the stuff from the
smart-ass with the beard and hat standing on top of
the Rocky Mountains and I haven't been disappointed
yet. Much cleaner, just a number of assemblies all
discretely using the MyXaml namespace, well documented
with examples and tutorials, no annoyances so far and
it has a nice validator (MyLint) that helps you
getting your source right. There is one thing that
seems to be common among XAML sub-systems though.
They all (well, at least the two I looked at) seem to
assume that I want to create this application
featuring this one main XAML form. That is not what I
want. I want to say "This is my container (just a
control acting as a parent), this is my XAML, now go
ahead and combine them for me". I want to host a piece
of XAML in my own application and interact with it. I
haven't found a single example doing that, they all
start with Form as the outer element. If I replace
Form with something else it probably works but it
blows up as soon as the control finds it has no
parent. Fair enough. But can it be done? It seems such
a common application that everybody wants.
I may have missed a thing or two, these are just first
impressions from a fairly experienced programmer
getting his feet wet with XAML.
Martin.
What's your take? Do you prefer MyXAML over Xamlon?
Has anyone tried out Xamlon or MyXAML? What's your
experience. Let us know.
- Gerald
---------------------------
Gerald Bauer
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http://richcon.com
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