Cannot find "cross-platform using PCL" while creating a xamarin app - xamarin

I want to create a xamarin cross platform using PCL. I do not find this option while creating a project. Am I missing any installations?
Is "Xamarin.UITest Cross Platform Test Project" similar to that? But that does not open Android and IOS directories in it

The PCL option is deprecated .
From the official documentation:
Portable Class Libraries (PCLs) are considered deprecated in the
latest versions of Visual Studio. While you can still open, edit, and
compile PCLs, for new projects it is recommended to use .NET Standard
libraries to access a larger API surface area.
If you wan't to create a Xamarin.Forms solution, you must select the Mobile App (Xamarin.Forms) template. Nowadays, everything moved to .netstandard 2.0

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No portable class library folder found in Xamarin Forms

I am a newbie working with Xamarin Forms in Visual studio 2019.
When I create a blank page for Mobile App(Xamarin.Forms) , I do not see a Xamarin.forms portable template app in my project solution.
There is no PCL anymore. PCL is outdated. Just use the Mobile App (Xamarin.Forms) template. It will create all you need.
The core project (that contains your shared code) will be a .net standard project.
.net standard is way better than PCL, because you don't have a artificially limited set of APIs.
this creates the following 3 projects
Your shared code should go into the App8 project

Using platform specific httclienthandler?

In xamarin should I always configure the app to use the platform specific httpclienthandler or is it ok to use the default httpclienthandler. I have read that you get better performance but I was just wondering if it is so much better that this should be a standard practice for all my xamarin apps.
It is ok to use httpclienthandler in the portable class library(pcl). Feel free to use HttpClient to run in a PCL library that supports iOS, Android, and WP8.
Here how i did it. Restart from a clean project.
Create a PCL with iOS, Android, .NET 4.5 and WP8. Add the microsoft Http nuget. It will install 2 other packages into the PCL.
Create the Android and iOS projects. Reference your PCL in both projects. For me that's all. It just works.
You may add the reference "System.Net.Http" in both platform projects. The reference is under Assemblies/Framework.
NEVER add Microsoft.Http nuget in any native project, nor the BCL nuget. It will create mess and you'll have to clean lots of things before it can work again.
It is extremely important that your NuGet manager is up to date, go to Tools-> Extensions and updates -> Updates

Not able to find out Portable Class Libraries project in visual studio 2017 when creating cross platform app

Hi when i am going to create new xamarin forms app I'm not able to see Protable Class Library in the Sharing Code Strategy options in VS 2017 .enter image description here
Please help me in this
That's the expected behavior, it's no longer possible to create a PCL library with Visual Studio 2017 as they've been replaced by .NET Standard libraries, see here for more details.
Also, the roadmap and the comparison with PCL profiles is available here, so you can determine the right .NET Standard version for you depending on your target framework and the APIs you need to place in the shared library.
.NET Standard libraries are the replacement for Portable Class Libraries. They allow you access to more of the framework than pcl did. You can still manually create a PCL project and reference it in a Xamarin app if you would like to use PCLs in new mobile apps with Xamarin.

Can not compile after migrating unified api in xamarin forms

We have migrated the xamarin forms project to unified api.
But we have the strange compile error like this:
Could not AOT the assembly '.../iOS/obj/iPhone/Debug/mtouch-cache/Build/Xamarin.Forms.Labs.dll
So I changed the settings in iOS project's options.
In ios Build Tab of Project options(iOS) I changed the "don't link" to "Link all assemblies".
But the app is crashed when it is started.
xamarin version is 5.7.1(build 17).
xamarin forms's version is 1.3.5.6337.
xamarin forms labs's version is 1.0.1.5.
Please help me if you have the experience with this error.
Replace Xamarin.Forms.Labs with XLabs.Forms.
There has been a major refactoring on how the XLabs project is structured so your existing project based on the 1.x.x will break. The reason for the refactoring was simple; separate functionality that does not depend on Xamarin.Forms into different assemblies. This allows the use of functionality like IoC, Serialization and even platform specific services without referencing XF.
To upgrade:
Uninstall any existing Xamarin.Forms.Labs packages from your
project.
Install XLabs.Forms package to your projects (PCL, iOS, Droid & WP). This will update Xamarin.Forms to the latest stable release (1.4.x)
Refactor code to reference the correct namespaces.

Xamarin IDE and visualstudio for windows +Mvvmcross

I have some confusions About the IDE to use for MvvmCross
a) VisualStudio (VS) uses Xamrarin.iOS and Xamarin.Android plugin for iOS and Android development. But can we also use PCL(Portable Class libraries) and MVVMCross/Monocross frameworks in VS? I see the PCL option on VS but, i don't see the support for Android & iOS. Do i need to install additional plugin for PCL to support these two platforms as well?
b) Xamarin IDE supports Android and iOS development on Mac but, is it true that Xamarin doesn't support Mono.iOS on windows? Isn't it strange that Visual studio can use the network mac for iOS development but why not Xamarin Studio?
Thank You for your time.
Regards,
Saurav
a) VisualStudio (VS) uses Xamrarin.iOS and Xamarin.Android plugin for iOS and Android development. But can we also use PCL(Portable Class libraries) and MVVMCross/Monocross frameworks in VS? I see the PCL option on VS but, i don't see the support for Android & iOS. Do i need to install additional plugin for PCL to support these two platforms as well?
MvvmCross currently uses Profile104 for Portable Class Library development. You can easily develop for this profile without installing Android and iOS. The mapping of PCL profile to platforms is, however, quite confusing (it's not exactly obvious) so the easiest way I find to create a Profile104 PCL is:
to create any PCL
then to manually edit the csproj file to say Profile104 - look for a line like: https://github.com/slodge/MvvmCross-Tutorials/blob/master/Babel/Babel.Core/Babel.Core.csproj#L14 in the csproj
I have customers who develop in medium size teams where only some people have the Xamarin tools installed - most people have just Windows tools and work on the PCLs using Unit Tests and using WindowsPhone/Store user interfaces.
b) Xamarin IDE supports Android and iOS development on Mac but, is it true that Xamarin doesn't support Mono.iOS on windows?
Yes, this is true.
Isn't it strange that Visual studio can use the network mac for iOS development but why not Xamarin Studio?
This may feel strange, but I believe this is actually this is Xamarin listening to their customers.
I believe, that the reason customers wanted Windows support for iOS was because they wanted to use Visual Studio and they wanted to use plugins like Resharper. Xamarin provided this in their 2.0 release.
It is true that they could also have added iOS functionality to XamarinStudio for Windows as well - but this (I believe) wasn't what any of their customers were asking for - so adding it would have created more work (both in creating and maintaining it) without adding any significant benefit (IMO)

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