Avalonia bolts Linux and WebAssembly onto .NET MAUI

Summary

AvaloniaUI has previewed MAUI support for Linux and WebAssembly browser applications — platforms Microsoft's own cross-platform .NET framework lacks — but low adoption and persistent bugs are likely to constrain uptake. The Avalonia team has previewed a backend for MAUI (multi-platform app UI) using .NET 11 (itself in preview), enabling developers to add Linux and WebAssembly targets to their cross-platform GUI (graphical user interface) applications using the framework. The potential impact on MAUI is greater than it first appears. Cross-platform frameworks take one of two approaches to how they render controls such as buttons and switches, either calling native platform APIs to display the controls built into the operating system, or using custom drawing to provide their own versions of those controls. The native approach ensures a correct look and feel for each platform, while the custom-drawn method provides more cross-platform consistency. MAUI uses native APIs whereas Avalonia does custom drawing, but what the Avalonia team has done is to enable the use of Avalonia controls either alongside or in place of the MAUI controls. MAUI controls rendered in the browser via Avalonia and WebAssembly Avalonia is an open source GUI framework for .NET inspired by WPF (Windows Presentation Foundation). Developer Steven Kirk created it in 2013, when WPF appeared abandoned. Avalonia offered both an actively developed framework for developers with WPF skills and applications, and a way to port those applications to macOS and Linux. Community interest in Avalonia has made it one of the most active .NET open source projects, and it now targets iOS, Android, and WebAssembly, as well as macOS and Windows. The new preview is based on .NET 11, which is expected to be generally available in November, meaning that Avalonia MAUI will remain in preview until then. According to software engineer Tim Miller, "there are still many areas to address," including a version of the Microsoft MAU...