Development Tools

About Software Development Kits (SDKs)

A software development kit (SDK) is a set of tools for developing in a particular programming language (in our class, C#). Developing in a language means everything from compiling to running and (when things go wrong) to debugging programs.

The Microsoft SDK is the proprietary implementation of .Net. It runs only on Windows and is the primary development framework for all things Microsoft.

The Mono Project SDK <http://mono-project.com> is the free/open source equivalent implementation of the Microsoft SDK. It runs on all major platforms (including Windows) and is needed in situations where you want to develop .Net applications on non-Windows platforms.

As an interesting aside, the company whose developers lead the work on the Mono SDK are working on commercial tools that allow you to develop/run applications written in .Net on Apple iOS and Android mobile devices (phones and tablets).

Editing and Building Tools

Early programs were written with rudimentary text editors, more primitive than Windows Notepad. Gradually tools got better. Now there are editors that are highly optimized for editing code.

After code is edited, it has to be converted into an executable program. That may involve several files and libraries and other dependencies. Streamlining and automating this process was a big deal. There are a variety of building tools that can be used with, or built into an SDK: make, ant, and now NAnt for .net.

Many developers use an a la carte approach, using their favorite editor along with their favorite building tool.

About Integrated Development Environments (IDE)

There are also all-in-one tools that combine an editor and build tools. These are also used by many developers.

There are two major IDEs for .Net development, which we explain briefly below:

Visual Studio is the Microsoft IDE that interfaces directly to the Microsoft SDK.
Xamarin Studio is the free/open source IDE for developing applications using the Mono SDK on Windows and all other platforms (in particular, Linux and OS X). The project started as MonoDevelop. Now Xamarin is both a major contributor to the code and has commercial versions for iOS development. The name on the software is now Xamarin Studio, though you may see references to MonoDevelop instead.

In addition, there is another Windows-specific IDE, SharpDevelop, that inspired the creation of Xamarin Studio. It is still actively maintained and provides a somewhat “lighter weight” alternative to Visual Studio for Windows users. Like Xamarin Studio, it is aimed at developers who would prefer a more free/open source “friendly” version.

Our Approach

In the interest of providing a consistent experience for our students who use various operating systems on their own machines, we will be using the multi-platform Mono (the SDK).

We find the IDE Xamarin Studio convenient to integrate everything for a beginner, and it is a powerful tool at a more advanced level. Hence we start off introducing and using Xamarin Studio. Later we will look at some of the underlying tools that are obscured by the use of Xamarin Studio.

Mono has an extra advantage in the tool csharp, for immediate testing of small snippets of code. We will use it extensively as we introduce bits of syntax.

As there is significant evolution of both the Microsoft and Mono toolchains–a fancy word we want you to know and a more elegant way of saying SDK–we’ll issue updates to this book.

Everything is free, but there are a number of steps. Follow them carefully.

Installing Mono and Xamarin Studios

Because the Mono Project web page is known to change frequently, these instructions are designed to be as generic as possible. If you have any questions, you should contact the instructors immediately or seek tutoring help.

OS X

Warning

Xamarin Studio needs at least version 10.8 of OSX. If you have an older version, you can upgrade the operating system, or possibly use an older version of Xamarin Studio. In that case, ask for help.

There are two downloads to get and install in order. Mono first:

Go to <http://mono-project.com>.
Look for the Mono downloads link. Link on OS-X. You want to get the latest stable version of Mono for OS X. For this class, you need version 2.10 or later, though preferably 3.2.4 or later. Choose the MRE version. It installs directly. Administrative privileges are required to run the installer, so if you do not know this information, please stop here.

Do not download Xamarin Studio from this site. This version of Xamararin Studio bugs you with emails.

Here is how to do a quick sanity check of your Mono setup:

Go to Applications -> Utilities and launch the Terminal application, or quicker: enter terminal in Spotlight. (Terminal is how you get to a command-line shell in OS X.)
You’ll see a prompt that looks like this computername:folder user$. This means that Terminal is ready for input.
Type which csharp and hit enter/return. You should see /usr/bin/csharp as output. csharp is the C# interpreter.
Type which mcs and hit enter/return. You should see /usr/bin/mcs as output. mcs is one of the interfaces to the C# compiler.

Xamarin Studio Installation - OSX

Make sure Mono is installed first.
Now go to http://monodevelop.com. Note: Do not use a version that is linked to the mono-project.com site. Getting the suggested open-source version from http://monodevelop.com should not lead to a prompt for your email address….
As with Mono, we need to look for the downloads link. You should download the stable version.
For OS X, the Xamarin Studio SDK is distributed as a DMG disk image. You’ll need to download this image and double-click it. Open the image and run the installer. Administrative privileges are required to run the installer.
This time, you will see an App for Xamarin Studio, which you can drag and drop into the Applications folder.
If the preceding steps were successful, you can launch Xamarin Studio by double-clicking the icon in your Applications folder. (You won’t know what to do with it yet, but at least you can verify that it launches correctly and then use Command-Q to exit.)

Windows

There are four packages, so this takes a while. Mono first:

Dr. Yacobellis has a video showing Windows installation. https://connect.luc.edu/p4hmzk2kbmt/ There may be further changes to the system.

Go to <http://mono-project.com>.
Look for the Mono downloads link. You want to get the latest stable version of Mono for Windows. For this class, you need version 2.10 or later, preferably 3.2.3 or later.
Choose the link: Mono for Windows, Gtk#, and XSP, and download the installation package
It is a self-extracting executable, so you will need to double click it to install. For Windows 7 users, you may need to check your taskbar to see whether the installer is being held up by Microsoft’s enhanced security, UAM, that makes sure you really want to install something you downloaded from the internet.

Here is how to do a quick sanity check of your Mono setup:

Mono Command Prompt

Open the Windows Start Menu and type “mono” in the text field at the bottom. You should see a short list of places “mono” appears.
Click on the choice that says “Mono … Command prompt”. (This is probably faster than going to the Start Menu, finding the Mono folder, expanding it, and clicking on the Mono Command Prompt.)

If it comes up, you are all set for an initial installation check. This will be the first step later, when you want to run the handy csharp program or compile and run your own programs. When working, you can just leave this window open, saving it for later use, (or close and reopen later….)

Xamarin Studio Installation - Windows

Have Mono installed first.
Now go to http://monodevelop.com. Note: Do not use a version that is linked to the mono-project.com site. Getting the suggested open-source version from http://monodevelop.com should not lead to a prompt for your email address….
As with Mono, we need to look for the downloads link, click on the Windows icon. You should click the link for the download of the requirements for the stable version. That should be at least numbered 4.2.2. Do not install it yet.

Note however, that you will next install two support packages:
- .Net Framework 4.0 first. The link takes you to a Microsoft download site. Do not click the top Download button - that gives you much more than you need. Further down in Popular download 01 is Microsoft .NET Framework 4 (Web Installer). Click on that and follow the default sequence.
- GKT# The GKT@ download directly downloads the GKT installer. Again follow the default installation sequence.
- install Xamarin Studio last. The Download link gets you the installer directly. Install it following the default steps.
If the preceding steps were successful, you can launch Xamarin Studio by double-clicking the icon on the Desktop or using the Start Menu. (You won’t know what to do with it yet, but at least you can verify at it launches correctly and then close the window.)

Linux

We only provide instructions for Debian-based Linux distributions such as Ubuntu.

Using the command-line apt-get tool, you can install everything that you need using apt-get install monodevelop. This should be run as the root user (using the sudo command).
You can test the sanity of your setup by following the instructions under OS X.

Xamarin Studio releases on Linux tend to lag behind the official stable release.

This page, https://launchpad.net/~keks9n/+archive/monodevelop-latest, describes how to update your Xamarin Studio setup if it is not version 2.8 or later as we’ll need for this course.

We wish to stress that Linux is recommended for students who already have a bit of programming experience under their belts. It can take a significant amount of energy to get a Linux setup up and running and to tweak it to your liking. While it has gotten ever so much easier since the 1990s when it first appeared, we encourage you to set it up perhaps a bit later in the semester or consider running it using virtualization software (on Mac or Windows) such as VirtualBox or VMware.