#ifdef Windows
All about creating cool apps and tech on Windows.
Latest posts
Modernize your UWP app with preview UWP support for .NET 9 and Native AOT
We’re introducing the initial preview UWP (Universal Windows Platform) support for .NET 9, providing a path for existing UWP developers to modernize their apps with the latest .NET and Native AOT. Are you a UWP app developer considering migrating to Windows App SDK and WinUI 3? Or wanting to leverage the latest releases of .NET and Native AOT? Or perhaps you’ve been struggling with referencing new versions of your favorite libraries, because they only include support for .NET 6 and above? Well, look no further! This preview UWP support for .NET 9 provides a path for UWP apps to modernize using the...
Announcing Windows Community Toolkit v8.1
Announcing Windows Community Toolkit v8.1 We're happy to announce that version 8.1 is available today! It's a minor update which contains a variety of new features and improvements, made possible again with the support and contributions of our developer community. 🎉 If you're not familiar with the Windows Community Toolkit, see below here! Or download our Sample Gallery from the Microsoft Store to start exploring what it has available for WinUI developers. At a Glance 🔍 Important Changes Dependencies/TFM The Toolkit's dependencies h...
Announcing Windows Community Toolkit v8.0
Announcing Windows Community Toolkit v8.0 🎉🎉🎉 It's here! The Windows Community Toolkit is back with a huge update with an array of improvements and features. We're happy to announce that version 8.0 is available today! Made possible again with the support and contributions of our developer community. 🎉 If you're new to the Toolkit, the Windows Community Toolkit is a collection of controls for WinUI 2, WinUI 3, and Uno Platform developers! It simplifies and demonstrates common developer tasks building experiences for Windows 10 and Windows 11 with .NET. The Toolkit is part of the .NET Foundation. You can downl...
Windows Community Toolkit 8.0 Pre-release
The Windows Community Toolkit 8.0 Pre-release We're thrilled to announce the first official pre-release packages for the Windows Community Toolkit 8.0 have been released to NuGet.org! 🎉🎉🎉 This blog is going to provide a brief overview of how to get started using these preview packages and how to provide feedback. This has been a culmination of nearly two years of work in understanding how we can better maintain the Toolkit, make it easier to contribute to, target multiple platforms with a single codebase, and still maintain a high quality bar! If you're still new to the Toolkits, you can find an introd...
Microsoft Store Open Source Series — AppServices library
Looking for ways to empower your UWP app beyond what you thought was possible? Today, we're going to show you how to leverage the AppServices library we built for the Microsoft Store to unlock the power of Win32 APIs. Plus, we have a new source generator which makes using app services a piece of cake! 🍰 This is part of our new "Microsoft Store Open Source Series" of blog posts, expanding on our prior posts about the new Microsoft Store for Windows — reducing binary size with trimming, and migrating from C++/WinRT to C#. The Microsoft Store Open Source Series In our previous blog posts, we used the Micros...
Introducing the Microsoft Store channel on Discord
This post was co-authored with Priyanka Gupta Kankane ( on Discord), Senior Program Manager in the Microsoft Store services team. We are excited to announce the launch of the channel on Discord, a dedicated space where you can connect, engage, and share feedback on everything related to the Microsoft Store app, website, Partner Center, MSIX packaging, and AppInstaller. It's time to get your questions answered and join the conversation! 🎉 This channel is part of the UWP Community Discord server, a place that connects Windows App users, creators and engineers from around the world. If you don't have Disco...
The Windows Community Toolkit 2023 Update
It's been a pretty busy year for the Windows Community Toolkit (WCT), even though you may not realize it! We wanted to share what we've been working on, why it's important, where things are at, and how you can help! If you're new to the Toolkits, you can find an introduction video to them here. In 2022, we announced the Windows Community Toolkit Labs as the starting point for all new components in the Toolkit itself (see our previous article for some of these). It was also for us to test a whole new infrastructure for building the Windows Community Toolkit. Now, with a single-codebase we can write a com...
Windows Community Toolkit Labs Experiments are Here!
In this post, we talk about the new Windows Community Toolkit Labs and some initial experiments that we're looking for feedback on.
Announcing the Windows Community Toolkit Labs!
In this post, we talk about the new Community Toolkit Labs for Windows as the future starting point for components in the Windows Community Toolkit.