UWP, C#, XAML, MVVM, EF and SQLite - Code Red and Green (2023)

Last week, I describe a programming project I started this year. It's a time tracking app that not only tracks what you spend your time on, but also tries to influence those decisions.

I'll get into the initial coding details next week. This week I'm going to expand the tech stack I'm working on.

Universal Windows Platform (UWP)

When choosing a technology stack for your app, the first decision to make is which devices you want to run it on. This determines the target audience and influences the user interface and subsequent technology choices.

The target audience for my app are knowledge workers (such as developers) who want to track how much time they spend on their desktop or laptop. My priority is not to keep track of the total time for all my daily activities. Therefore, mobile or tablet based apps are currently not included.

What do developers use on their desktops and laptops? This2016 Stack Overflow Developer SurveyName the four types of desktop operating systems:

• Mac OS X (used by 26.2% of respondents)
• Windows version (52.2%)
• Linux distributions (21.7%)

Windows remains the clear leader, although research reports show year-over-year trends in favor of Mac OS X. However, since I am a Windows user, I will elaborate on this option.

For the latest version of Windows, Windows 10, this is called the latest application architectureUniversal Windows platform(UWP). Part of UWP's appeal is that it can target multiple devices (phones, tablets, and desktops, for example) using a single codebase. This might work for my app at some point, but the main benefit right now is that UWP is the modern choice for building Windows 10 desktop apps.

Back to the developer survey results: 20.8% of respondents use Windows 10 as their development environment. Another 8.4% use Windows 8.x. This is a notoriously unpopular version of Windows, so I suspect many of these users are considering an upgrade. This equates to 29.2% of developers likely to test the app soon. That's not an overwhelming number, nor is it a huge number for a for-profit company, but it's far from a niche market. As an open source experiment that I want to use for my own purposes, it makes sense.

Why not create a web application that can run on any platform? For single-user applications, this is not a good compromise. Desktop applications are easier to create and provide more direct access to operating system services. This can be useful for advanced functions, such as getting a list of running programs and open web pages. So is UWP.

C♯

UWP apps can be developed in many programming languages, but C# was an easy choice for me. It's a language I use a lot, it doesn't have the syntax problems of Java and there are plenty of examples online of how to use it to build UWP apps.

Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML)

XAMLIt is a markup language used to define the user interface of UWP applications, just as HTML is used to describe web pages. XAML can be used to define buttons, text boxes, grids (for layout), lists, and other controls. He can alsotie up.

Binding is a method of linking an XAML control to a method or property in code. For example, a text box can be bound to a property so that when the user types in the text box, the property is updated. Another common connection is between a method in code and a button click event. This method is called when the user clicks the button.

Visual Studio has an XAML editor that keeps the visual design in sync with its XAML: you can drag and drop controls into the visual editor and the XAML markup is updated automatically. You can update the XAML manually and see the effect in the visual editor. This provides both the convenience of drag-and-drop scheduling and the benefit of text-based formatting files that can be maintained in a version control system.

Model-View-ViewModel (MVVM)

UWP does not enforce any specific program design. Developers are free to use the platform as they see fit. However, some designs fit better than others.Model-View-ViewModel(MVVM) is an architectural pattern designed for use with Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF), the predecessor of UWP, which also uses XAML to define the user interface.

The purpose of MVVM is to divide application code into groups of related components, each with a specific role. Here's how MVVM works in UWP apps:

• ItModelHandles business logic and database communications.
• Itmodel viewTake data from a model and organize or format it in a way that is convenient for the user interface.
• ItdisplayDefine the user interface. The data that the UI needs to read and write comes from the ViewModel via the data connection.

Separating these three concerns allows developers to focus on one thing at a time when deploying an application. Or for larger projects, multiple developers can work on one system while avoiding code conflicts. It also helps with unit testing as components are easier to test individually.

Entity Framework (EF)

A time-tracking application must store data such as job names and start/end times. Since the computer crashes and restarts, simply storing them in memory is not enough. We need some kind of persistent data store and the model needs a way to talk to that data store.

For UWP apps, the recommended way is to connect the model to the databaseEntity framework(EF). EF is oneObject relational mappingframework (ORM), a method of accessing a relational database using an object-oriented programming language without manually writing code to convert between the object model and the data model. Because object-oriented programs and relational databases represent data differently, using an ORM for conversion can simplify the programming process. It allows developers to think in terms of an object model without worrying about how it will be represented in the database.

There are some performance pitfalls to be aware of when using an ORM. Compilers can generate assembly code faster than almost anyone, while ORMs tend to generate less than ideal queries. Knowing what's going on under the hood can help prevent such problems.

she asked

We've reached the bottom of the technology stack: the database.she askedis a popular embedded database engine recommended for local UWP app data storage. Besides coming with Windows 10, SQLite has been used by many common programs over the years, including Chrome and Firefox.

The Entity Framework project maintains a database provider that allows EF to be used with SQLite databases.

technology

Of all the components of this planned technology stack, I think UWP is the most dangerous. Although it has been around for a few years, it is still very new compared to other .NET options for building Windows desktop applications, such as Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) and Windows Forms.

Fortunately, WPF also plays well with other patterns and components (C#, XAML, MVVM, EF, and SQLite). If I run into limitations that UWP can't overcome, I can always switch to WPF without wasting too much work.

Next week: In the code.

(Image source: designed+SQLite-logo(Public space))