So let’s cut right to the chase, I’m starting a blog! More specifically a blog about “a day in the life of a Xamarin developer.” In the past I had occasionally worked on a blog but I wasn’t consistent with the posts and I was using Wordpress which I wasn’t a fan of. This time is going to be different I promise.

I began looking at Xamarin in the 2nd quarter of 2013, so just shy of four years ago. Before Xamarin development I worked on a lot of rich Internet applications for the desktop, web, and mobile using Adobe Flash/Flex/AIR. Adobe’s developer tools were getting worse, their developer community was leaving droves which made me a developer without a home, and not just any developer, I was an independent developer so it was crucial for me to figure out my next move.

The Journey Begins

In April of 2013 a friend and colleague named Steve Killingbeck sent me the following email:

That email changed my career. I soon realized I was in over my head with Xamarin and needed help. I was trying to learn about the Xamarin platform, Xamarin.iOS, Xamarin.Android, a new IDE, and I was brand new to C#! And when I say brand new I mean I had never written a line of C# in my life.

At this point Steve and I were both new to all of the above and we knew there was no better way than to dive straight in. We began researching/studying Xamarin and we had also been members of other local meetup groups so we did a search for Xamarin in the Minneapolis area. No Xamarin meetup results came back so we started the Minnesota Enterprise Mobile Meetup group. Minnesota Enterprise Mobile partnered with a local technology consulting company called RBA Consulting to help with finding meeting venues, getting an initial selection of speakers, and covering the costs of food/beverage for the meetings. The group was a success and still meets once per month and has over 430 members in the Twin Cities area and is now sponsored by ILM Professional Services.

The Announcement of Xamarin University

In early 2014 I received an email from the Xamarin Blog that announced the start of Xamarin University, which was a year long training program to learn all things Xamarin and also worked towards a Xamarin Certification. I knew this would be a game changer, the only downside was the price ($2,000 per year). This is a lot of money and to an independent developer who needed to re-tool. I knew this meant there would be down months ahead when devoting a large portion of my time toward the Xamarin University program. I also knew however it was the right choice and signed up for Xamarin University in March of 2014.

The Xamarin University program was amazing and it was just what I needed to jump start into a new career path. It had courses on Xamarin.iOS and Xamarin.Android to start. In May of 2014 with the release of Xamarin 3, Xamarin.Forms was announced, the cross-platform UI solution to mobile development with Xamarin.

First Look at Xamarin.Forms

I was hesitant to jump on Xamarin.Forms given my previous experience with Adobe’s attempt in this space (the write once run everywhere approach) but finally decided to give it a try on a client project in the Fall of 2014. The benefit to this project was that it was a proof of concept and only needed to be built for iOS. The proof of concept project was a success in Xamarin.Forms and the client was very happy with the final build.

My First Xamarin Evolve

Also in the Fall of 2014 was the second Xamarin Evolve conference, a week long conference with world class presenters and training in Xamarin development. Steve and I got tickets and went to Atlanta for our first Evolve conference. Xamarin’s Evolve conference was sold-out and after the week I knew why. The first two days were dedicated to training (similar to Xamarin University) and the following days were the conference. Xamarin also knows how to treat conference attendees! Each night was a different event with all beverage and food covered. The most memorable night was when they rented out the Georgia Aquarium.

Also during that first Xamarin.Forms project, Xamarin University began to offer courses in Xamarin.Forms as well as basic C# classes. In March of 2015 I completed all of the Xamarin University courses and took the certification exam and passed! I can honestly say, this was a big turning point. Being able to tell potential clients that I was Xamarin certified gave them confidence in the tools but more importantly gave them confidence in me (and it gave me confidence in myself as well).

The Payoff

Since the Xamarin certification, contract work went gangbusters. Moments of downtime were limited and I was now completely dedicated to solely working on Xamarin projects. My career had shifted completely in less than a year and a half. The remainder of 2015 and all of 2016 were fantastic, I worked on a variety of projects for a variety of different clients and the Minnesota Enterprise Mobile user group was doing great. In February of 2016 Microsoft agreed to acquire Xamarin which was huge news for everyone, but it was especially important because it would make selling the Xamarin platform to prospective clients much easier now that it would be a part of a large corporation like Microsoft.

The news of the Xamarin acquisition came about just before Xamarin’s third Xamarin Evolve conference, which took place in April of 2016 in Orlando, FL. Steve and I once again attended and once again we were not disappointed. At this Evolve conference we had one on one time with Xamarin engineers our first day to discuss topics of our choosing and after showing the engineers what we were working on in Xamairn.Forms they put us in touch with someone at Xamarin to do a case study for the Xamarin blog. For one of the evening events Xamarin also rented out a couple of the theme parks with Universal Studios, specifically Harry Potter World and Jurassic Park - Amazing!

New Beginnings

During 2016 I had one main client, a small startup called Mobile Composer. They were working on some very cool technology and were in the process of building out their team. They offered me a fulltime job over the summer of 2016 however I wasn’t in a place to accept because I was working on wrapping up my other ongoing client work. I did however finally join their team officially January 2nd, 2017 as a Senior Mobile Developer.