Hey guys, I thought I'd ask what you feel about the Xamarin IDE (Win10) for C# projects. I'd appreciate all input, but if you have experience with VS 2015 and want to share the Pros and Cons of Xamarin compared to VS, that'd be super as well. Or perhaps you could redirect me to some article or w/e, either on Gamedev.net or elsewhere online? Also, if you'd like to make a case for VS 2017 RC, I'd be happy to hear your opinions about that, too. But for now, I'm primarily interested in Xamarin, unless there a major compelling reason to stay clear or it.

For the record, I'm primarily an Indie Developer focused on simple 2D apps and I may try out mobile development as well, and learning Unity (one of several reasons I'm learning C#). I already know basic Java and C++, but I've been absent from actual programming the last year, in order to reorganize my life so I can go more heavily into programming full-time.

Thanks for any input.

When I used xamarin ide it crashes ALL the time. I would only pick it up again if it would give me pros, but I don't see any reason why I would drop VS2015, there is a lot of support on the internet for it and it has (almost?) everything I would ever need.

There is no need to use the xamarin IDE from what I understand. MS purchased xamarin and rolled up support for the library and projects into VS so VS should support out of the box now. If not with downloadable extensions

I would not use the RC until released, I get the feel it will be timed on or shortly after the next Win10 release in a month or so. C#7 brings some nice new syntax into the mix and worth switching for that imho but I am holding off until comes out of RC status.

Xamarin's IDE has been fine for me, in the past. It tries too much to clone Visual Studio (rather than explore new ideas), but this can also be a benefit to picking it up more easily. I wouldn't prefer it over Visual Studio itself, but I wouldn't mind using it on a platform (e.g., macOS) where VS wasn't available.

I'm using VS2017 right now, but I saw this guy who used Xamarin and I thought I'd hear people's opinion about it. But I've decided to stick with VS.