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  1. Stackups
  2. Application & Data
  3. Frameworks
  4. Cross Platform Mobile Development
  5. UIkIt vs Xamarin

UIkIt vs Xamarin

OverviewDecisionsComparisonAlternatives

Overview

Xamarin
Xamarin
Stacks1.3K
Followers1.5K
Votes785
UIkIt
UIkIt
Stacks791
Followers417
Votes262
GitHub Stars18.5K
Forks2.3K

UIkIt vs Xamarin: What are the differences?

Introduction

In this Markdown code, we will explore the key differences between UIkit and Xamarin, specifically focusing on six distinct points.

  1. Platform Compatibility: UIkit mainly focuses on web applications and is designed to work seamlessly with various web browsers. On the other hand, Xamarin is suitable for cross-platform mobile application development, allowing developers to create apps for iOS, Android, and Windows using a single codebase.

  2. Programming Language: UIkit utilizes HTML, CSS, and JavaScript for designing and implementing user interfaces. In contrast, Xamarin enables developers to use C# and .NET framework for building mobile applications, leveraging Microsoft technologies for app development.

  3. Community and Ecosystem: UIkit has a robust community that provides ongoing support, extensive documentation, and a wide range of plugins and extensions. Xamarin, backed by Microsoft, offers a strong developer community, official support, and integration with Visual Studio, enhancing the development experience.

  4. User Interface Components: UIkit offers a set of lightweight and modular front-end components to enhance the visual aspect of web applications. Xamarin provides a rich library of native user interface controls and elements, ensuring a native look and feel across different platforms.

  5. Performance Optimization: UIkit prioritizes lightweight and efficient components to optimize performance for web applications. In contrast, Xamarin focuses on native execution and performance tuning, delivering high-quality user experiences on various mobile devices.

  6. Development Environment: UIkit allows developers to create responsive web designs with a focus on simplicity and flexibility. Xamarin, integrated with Visual Studio, offers a complete development environment with debugging tools, emulators, and testing capabilities for cross-platform app development.

In Summary, the key differences between UIkit and Xamarin lie in platform compatibility, programming language, community support, user interface components, performance optimization, and development environment.

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Advice on Xamarin, UIkIt

Daniel
Daniel

Frontend Developer at atSistemas

Jun 10, 2020

Needs adviceonNew RelicNew RelicNext.jsNext.jsReactReact

I'm building, from scratch, a webapp. It's going to be a dashboard to check on our apps in New Relic and update the Apdex from the webapp. I have just chosen Next.js as our framework because we use React already, and after going through the tutorial, I just loved the latest changes they have implemented.

But we have to decide on a CSS framework for the UI. I'm partial to Bulma because I love that it's all about CSS (and you can use SCSS from the start), that it's rather lightweight and that it doesn't come with JavaScript clutter. One of the things I hate about Bootstrap is that you depend on jQuery to use the JavaScript part. My boss loves UIkIt, but when I've used it in the past, I didn't like it.

What do you think we should use? Maybe you have another suggestion?

1.07M views1.07M
Comments
Sai Karun
Sai Karun

Jan 30, 2020

Needs advice

We are re-modifying the existing portal to the new one. Looking out for a CSS framework where over-rides are possible, the performance of page loading, extendable, etc Please suggest between tailwind, UIkit and bootstrap frameworks explaining in detail on different factors. I request your help on the same.

595k views595k
Comments

Detailed Comparison

Xamarin
Xamarin
UIkIt
UIkIt

Xamarin’s Mono-based products enable .NET developers to use their existing code, libraries and tools (including Visual Studio*), as well as skills in .NET and the C# programming language, to create mobile applications for the industry’s most widely-used mobile devices, including Android-based smartphones and tablets, iPhone, iPad and iPod Touch.

UIkit gives you a comprehensive collection of HTML, CSS, and JS components which is simple to use, easy to customize and extendable.

Cross-platform development- Thinking about supporting iOS, Android, Mac and Windows? Xamarin allows you to write it all in C#.;Reuse existing code- Use your favorite .NET libraries in Xamarin apps. Easily use third-party native libraries and frameworks.; Discover as you type- Explore APIs as you type with code autocompletion.;Visual Studio or Xamarin Studio- Create, build, debug, and deploy apps in Visual Studio. Or use Xamarin Studio, a fully-featured IDE that is built for mobile app development.;Native UI, Native Performance- Xamarin delivers high performance compiled code with full access to all the native APIs so you can create native apps with device-specific experiences.; Point and Click UI Design- Xamarin provides a world class Android UI designer. Use Apple Xcode UI designer to create interfaces and Storyboards that automatically sync with your Xamarin.iOS project.
LESS - UIkit is developed in LESS to write well-structured, extendable code which is easy to maintain.;Components - A collection of small, responsive components using consistent and conflict-free naming conventions.;Customizer - UIkit's very basic style can be extended with themes and is easy to customize to create your own look.;Responsive - With the mobile-first approach UIkit provides a consistent experience from phones and tablets to desktops.
Statistics
GitHub Stars
-
GitHub Stars
18.5K
GitHub Forks
-
GitHub Forks
2.3K
Stacks
1.3K
Stacks
791
Followers
1.5K
Followers
417
Votes
785
Votes
262
Pros & Cons
Pros
  • 121
    Power of c# on mobile devices
  • 81
    Native performance
  • 79
    Native apps with native ui controls
  • 73
    No javascript - truely compiled code
  • 67
    Sharing more than 90% of code over all platforms
Cons
  • 9
    Build times
  • 5
    Visual Studio
  • 4
    Price
  • 3
    Scalability
  • 3
    Complexity
Pros
  • 39
    Complete GUI
  • 29
    Easy modify
  • 27
    Practical
  • 24
    Functional
  • 24
    Easy to learn

What are some alternatives to Xamarin, UIkIt?

Bootstrap

Bootstrap

Bootstrap is the most popular HTML, CSS, and JS framework for developing responsive, mobile first projects on the web.

Ionic

Ionic

Free and open source, Ionic offers a library of mobile and desktop-optimized HTML, CSS and JS components for building highly interactive apps. Use with Angular, React, Vue, or plain JavaScript.

Flutter

Flutter

Flutter is a mobile app SDK to help developers and designers build modern mobile apps for iOS and Android.

React Native

React Native

React Native enables you to build world-class application experiences on native platforms using a consistent developer experience based on JavaScript and React. The focus of React Native is on developer efficiency across all the platforms you care about - learn once, write anywhere. Facebook uses React Native in multiple production apps and will continue investing in React Native.

Foundation

Foundation

Foundation is the most advanced responsive front-end framework in the world. You can quickly prototype and build sites or apps that work on any kind of device with Foundation, which includes layout constructs (like a fully responsive grid), elements and best practices.

Semantic UI

Semantic UI

Semantic empowers designers and developers by creating a shared vocabulary for UI.

Materialize

Materialize

A CSS Framework based on material design.

Material Design for Angular

Material Design for Angular

Material Design is a specification for a unified system of visual, motion, and interaction design that adapts across different devices. Our goal is to deliver a lean, lightweight set of AngularJS-native UI elements that implement the material design system for use in Angular SPAs.

NativeScript

NativeScript

NativeScript enables developers to build native apps for iOS, Android and Windows Universal while sharing the application code across the platforms. When building the application UI, developers use our libraries, which abstract the differences between the native platforms.

Material-UI

Material-UI

Material UI is a library of React UI components that implements Google's Material Design.

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