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Mono implemented the GUI stuff like Windows Forms, do the latest windows cross platform stuff support that? Can you run .Net GUI windows program on linux withou

Mono implemented the GUI stuff like Windows Forms, do the latest windows cross platform stuff support that? Can you run .Net GUI windows program on linux without Mono but using the latest .Net thing ? I know it was not possible in the past.

deaddodo 2y ago
.net Core doesn't supply WinForms, but WPF is the far more common paradigm for Windows apps now. WPF is supported by projects like Avalonia on Linux. There are also a few other major alternative UI toolkits, more commonly used by cross-platform (vs Windows-exclusive) developers.
- Kwpolska 2y ago
  .NET Core does support Windows Forms just fine, but it’s only available on Windows.
  - deaddodo 2y ago
    [flagged]
pionar 2y ago
You can use third party libs like Avalonia[1] or Uno[2] [1] https://avaloniaui.net/ https://avaloniaui.net/ [2] https://platform.uno/ https://platform.uno/
- simion314 2y ago
  Sure, nobody wants to write Winforms new applications today My point is about running existing applications on Linux, there are still issues with running .Net GUI stuff under wine and Mono was not a perfect implementation. I read in other comments that the newer .Net cross platform stuff is not a replacement for Mono for running this old applications. (nobody will rewrite them to use the current GUI stuff from MS since are old apps)
  - moron4hire 2y ago
    No, Microsoft's .NET only supports WinForms on Windows. They do have an official cross platform GUI toolkit in MAUI, but it strangely does not support Linux.
    - runevault 2y ago
      Last I knew it is also considered pretty lackluster. Every time I read up on it it feels like, even beyond the lack of Linux support people just don't care for it. If I was building a cross platform native app with .NET I'd probably use Avalonia right now.
      - moomin 2y ago
        Yeah, the took an age delivering it, then it came out and most of the early reports were “It’s still not ready.” and then I think Microsoft just gave up. I think not supporting Linux was a tactical error, though. Some people will put up with a lot for Linux GUI support, and some of those people are the types who can resolve problems with your half-baked GUzi framework.
        runevault 2y ago
        Oh yeah I agree lack of Linux support is a major issue. Just even without it there are so many other issues I dunno that Linux support helps much.
        neonsunset 2y ago
        Does it really need help? I struggle to imagine a scenario where one would consider MAUI not supporting Linux to be an issue (if we discard superficial bad faith concern) when Avalonia, Uno or, if you care about Linux as the main target, Gir.Core exist. And, at the end of the day, you have a tool with an extremely rich FFI capability so whatever is available from C you can use as well.
        2y ago
eppp 2y ago
No, they pretty much gave up on winforms when .net core morphed into "the" .net that is cross platform. There are some nice crossplatform gui libs now though.
- LAC-Tech 2y ago
  What are the ones to use in 2024? I used to code informs, it was a great improvement on its successors.
- starik36 2y ago
  Not really. Winforms have been updated to .net core. And a bunch of handy features to modernize it have been added. I'd say it's the simplest and quickest way to go if you need to bang out a quickie app for Windows only. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/desktop/winforms/?view=netdesktop-8.0 https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/desktop/winforms/?v...
  - glzone1 2y ago
    If true this would be huge. I got burned on the whole silverlight, Universal Windows Platform, WPF etc. All these new and improved solutions had all sorts of issues, no designer, no or weaker accessibility stories, bloated, slow etc etc. C# + Winforms would be appealing. Some of the performance with larger datasets in the new solutions (tables etc) was just surprising. I really feel like Microsoft got so distracted chasing phones, tables, touch etc they forget just basic line of business application development which they could and should have owned.
neonsunset 2y ago
You are expected to use Avalonia or Uno for multi-platform targeting or Gir.Core (GTK4) or one of the many other binding libraries for Linux-specific GUI. Also very easy to throw something together on top of SDL2 with Silk.NET. Practically speaking it is in a much better place than many languages considered by parts of Linux community to be more """linux-oriented""".
- simion314 2y ago
  My personal use case is running old GUI apps, I am not planning on writing GUI apps with .Net , MS had the opportunity to open source .Net/Silverlight and make money from tools but they bet on Windows and today most apps are node and javascript, a much inferior platform but MS open things up too late.
toyg 2y ago
The whole point of .NET-Core was to remove all the (largely desktop-oriented) platform-specific dependencies that tied it to Windows, so you could run server-oriented .net programs on Linux. So no, afaik you can't simply run GUI apps built with .Net on Linux desktops - that's the reason Mono wasn't simply killed, because it covers that niche (which wouldn't even exist, were it not for Mono/Xamarin's efforts back then. But I digress...). Nowadays there are a few other attempts at providing that UI layer.
- dark-star 2y ago
  .net Core still has Windows Forms thoguh? At least I (for kicks) migrated one of my old .net 4.something projects to .net core and it still works and shows the classic Windows Forms GUI. It's (of course) not portable
  - snuxoll 2y ago
    .Net Core on Windows has support for loading assemblies that reference COM interfaces and the win32 API, along with other things that aren’t supported elsewhere like C++/CLI. That’s why loading System.Windows.Forms still works, it’s not part of .Net 5+, but it can still load the assemblies on Windows (they still use GDI, etc under the hood).
    - Kwpolska 2y ago
      System.Windows.Forms _is_ part of .NET 5+ — but only available on Windows.
qingcharles 2y ago
I think this is what you need now... https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/apps/maui https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/apps/maui "Build native, cross-platform desktop and mobile apps all in one framework." I know my buddy uses it to write Android apps on his Mac that interface to an ASP.NET Core web site.
- pests 2y ago
  I don't think that supports Linux tho
  - qingcharles 2y ago
    I had to check; you're right, no official support for Linux. Windows, macOS, iOS, Android. You can kludge Linux in with hacks.
- aversis_ 2y ago
  Isn't it just another Xamarin rebrand?

deaddodo 2y ago

.net Core doesn't supply WinForms, but WPF is the far more common paradigm for Windows apps now. WPF is supported by projects like Avalonia on Linux. There are also a few other major alternative UI toolkits, more commonly used by cross-platform (vs Windows-exclusive) developers.

Kwpolska 2y ago
.NET Core does support Windows Forms just fine, but it’s only available on Windows.
- deaddodo 2y ago
  [flagged]

pionar 2y ago

You can use third party libs like Avalonia[1] or Uno[2] [1] https://avaloniaui.net/ https://avaloniaui.net/ [2] https://platform.uno/ https://platform.uno/

simion314 2y ago
Sure, nobody wants to write Winforms new applications today My point is about running existing applications on Linux, there are still issues with running .Net GUI stuff under wine and Mono was not a perfect implementation. I read in other comments that the newer .Net cross platform stuff is not a replacement for Mono for running this old applications. (nobody will rewrite them to use the current GUI stuff from MS since are old apps)
- moron4hire 2y ago
  No, Microsoft's .NET only supports WinForms on Windows. They do have an official cross platform GUI toolkit in MAUI, but it strangely does not support Linux.
  - runevault 2y ago
    Last I knew it is also considered pretty lackluster. Every time I read up on it it feels like, even beyond the lack of Linux support people just don't care for it. If I was building a cross platform native app with .NET I'd probably use Avalonia right now.
    - moomin 2y ago
      Yeah, the took an age delivering it, then it came out and most of the early reports were “It’s still not ready.” and then I think Microsoft just gave up. I think not supporting Linux was a tactical error, though. Some people will put up with a lot for Linux GUI support, and some of those people are the types who can resolve problems with your half-baked GUzi framework.
      - runevault 2y ago
        Oh yeah I agree lack of Linux support is a major issue. Just even without it there are so many other issues I dunno that Linux support helps much.
        neonsunset 2y ago
        Does it really need help? I struggle to imagine a scenario where one would consider MAUI not supporting Linux to be an issue (if we discard superficial bad faith concern) when Avalonia, Uno or, if you care about Linux as the main target, Gir.Core exist. And, at the end of the day, you have a tool with an extremely rich FFI capability so whatever is available from C you can use as well.
        2y ago

eppp 2y ago

No, they pretty much gave up on winforms when .net core morphed into "the" .net that is cross platform. There are some nice crossplatform gui libs now though.

LAC-Tech 2y ago
What are the ones to use in 2024? I used to code informs, it was a great improvement on its successors.
starik36 2y ago
Not really. Winforms have been updated to .net core. And a bunch of handy features to modernize it have been added. I'd say it's the simplest and quickest way to go if you need to bang out a quickie app for Windows only. https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/desktop/winforms/?view=netdesktop-8.0 https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/dotnet/desktop/winforms/?v...
- glzone1 2y ago
  If true this would be huge. I got burned on the whole silverlight, Universal Windows Platform, WPF etc. All these new and improved solutions had all sorts of issues, no designer, no or weaker accessibility stories, bloated, slow etc etc. C# + Winforms would be appealing. Some of the performance with larger datasets in the new solutions (tables etc) was just surprising. I really feel like Microsoft got so distracted chasing phones, tables, touch etc they forget just basic line of business application development which they could and should have owned.

neonsunset 2y ago

You are expected to use Avalonia or Uno for multi-platform targeting or Gir.Core (GTK4) or one of the many other binding libraries for Linux-specific GUI. Also very easy to throw something together on top of SDL2 with Silk.NET. Practically speaking it is in a much better place than many languages considered by parts of Linux community to be more """linux-oriented""".

simion314 2y ago
My personal use case is running old GUI apps, I am not planning on writing GUI apps with .Net , MS had the opportunity to open source .Net/Silverlight and make money from tools but they bet on Windows and today most apps are node and javascript, a much inferior platform but MS open things up too late.

toyg 2y ago

The whole point of .NET-Core was to remove all the (largely desktop-oriented) platform-specific dependencies that tied it to Windows, so you could run server-oriented .net programs on Linux. So no, afaik you can't simply run GUI apps built with .Net on Linux desktops - that's the reason Mono wasn't simply killed, because it covers that niche (which wouldn't even exist, were it not for Mono/Xamarin's efforts back then. But I digress...). Nowadays there are a few other attempts at providing that UI layer.

dark-star 2y ago
.net Core still has Windows Forms thoguh? At least I (for kicks) migrated one of my old .net 4.something projects to .net core and it still works and shows the classic Windows Forms GUI. It's (of course) not portable
- snuxoll 2y ago
  .Net Core on Windows has support for loading assemblies that reference COM interfaces and the win32 API, along with other things that aren’t supported elsewhere like C++/CLI. That’s why loading System.Windows.Forms still works, it’s not part of .Net 5+, but it can still load the assemblies on Windows (they still use GDI, etc under the hood).
  - Kwpolska 2y ago
    System.Windows.Forms _is_ part of .NET 5+ — but only available on Windows.

qingcharles 2y ago

I think this is what you need now... https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/apps/maui https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/apps/maui "Build native, cross-platform desktop and mobile apps all in one framework." I know my buddy uses it to write Android apps on his Mac that interface to an ASP.NET Core web site.

pests 2y ago
I don't think that supports Linux tho
- qingcharles 2y ago
  I had to check; you're right, no official support for Linux. Windows, macOS, iOS, Android. You can kludge Linux in with hacks.
aversis_ 2y ago
Isn't it just another Xamarin rebrand?