Announcing: WinUI 2.6! 🎨💻🎉

[anawishnoff]

The team has just released WinUI 2.6! This release contains visual updates to most of our controls, a few new controls, bug fixes, and new functionality for use in UWP apps.

Release highlights

New controls

• Expander
• BreadcrumbBar
• AnimatedIcon
• PipsPager
• ImageIcon

Control visual updates

Most WinUI controls now support the latest Windows styles. These new styles align with the current design direction of Windows, and will provide your app with the most modern, up-to-date visual experience.

New materials

WinUI 2.6 is the first release to introduce Mica, which is a new material that incorporates theme and desktop wallpaper to paint the background of long-lived windows such as apps and settings. You can apply Mica to your application backdrop to delight users and create visual hierarchy, aiding productivity, by increasing clarity on which window is in focus.

Mica is specifically designed for app performance as it only samples the desktop wallpaper once to create its visualization.

New features

• SplitButton in CommandBar: You can now easily integrate a SplitButton into CommandBar using the SplitButtonCommandBarStyle and AppBarElementContainer wrapper class.
• Popup location: Several new APIs were added to the Popup class to allow developers to specify the direction how CommandBarFlyout opens up to ensure it is placed in a desired location relative to the item it is being involved from.

Bug fixes

To see the full list of bugs fixed in this release, see the official GitHub release.

Get started

If you're new to WinUI, get started by following the steps in this doc: Getting started with the WinUI 2.x library

If you've used WinUI in the past, get started with 2.6 by downloading the latest NuGet package: NuGet Download

Helpful links and resources

Release Notes - learn more about what's new in this release

XAML Controls Gallery - a sample WinUI app that shows you all of our controls in action, including the new controls and features in this release

API Reference Documentation - in-depth details about the new APIs added for this release

Thank you!

Your contributions as a developer community have been incredibly valuable in shipping WinUI. We'd like to extend a big thank you to everyone who contributed to this release by filing or fixing bugs, requesting features, implementing features, and generally being a significant part of the development process!

[Tropix126]

This looks great! Is there an estimate or rodemap on when these styles will arrive on WinUI 3?

[marcelwgn]

How can I as a developer use Mica? How does Mica manifest in the WinUI 2.6 source code?

[jevansaks]

How can I as a developer use Mica? How does Mica manifest in the WinUI 2.6 source code?

Docs are now live! https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/apps/design/style/mica

The code for it is here: #5261 and will be in main soon.

[marcelwgn]

Awesome, thank you Jevan!

[lhak]

All menus look very dark (e.g. the search box in the xaml controls gallery)

is this intended?

[ranjeshj]

@lhak no, can you please file an issue (with details on which OS version you are running it on) ?

[roxk]

I'm not sure, but it looks like the issue is related to #5133 . This is how date picker looks on light mode:

Note: Screenshot cannot capture the more subtle shadow behind the flyout, but both the search box in the screenshot above and this flyout have shadow.

Update: Added video below
https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/16918354/123316663-af06cd00-d55f-11eb-91a7-3ecdcd3b7e94.mp4

Windows 10 version	Saw the problem?
Insider Build (xxxxx)
21H1	Yes
October 2020 Update (19042)
May 2020 Update (19041)
November 2019 Update (18363)
May 2019 Update (18362)
October 2018 Update (17763)
April 2018 Update (17134)
Fall Creators Update (16299)
Creators Update (15063)

[mdtauk]

I remember a few of us mentioning the issue with dim Acrylic flyouts, as if the shadow layer renders on top - so not entirely sure if this is the same issue, or something new. As I understand it, WinUI is using DropDownShadows instead of the older Elevation based ThemeShadows

[nlogozzo]

I thought WinUI 3 was the future. When can we see these controls in WinUI 3?

[jevansaks]

I thought WinUI 3 was the future. When can we see these controls in WinUI 3?

It's harder because WinUI2 and WinUI3 are different codebases right now and it takes us a fair bit of time to merge the changes over from WinUI2 into WinUI3. We wanted to do it but we just didn't have the time to get that done by today's releases.

[nlogozzo]

@jevansaks Ah, I see. Any idea when this would be coming for WinUI 3? With Windows 11 pushing WinUI 3 and Windows App SDK, I feel like these new controls, features, and designs should be worked on WinUI 3 first, then backported to WinUI 2.

[zhuxb711]

I'm not sure, but it looks like the issue is related to #5133 . This is how date picker looks on light mode:

Note: Screenshot cannot capture the more subtle shadow behind the flyout, but both the search box in the screenshot above and this flyout have shadow.

Update: Added video below
https://user-images.githubusercontent.com/16918354/123316663-af06cd00-d55f-11eb-91a7-3ecdcd3b7e94.mp4

Windows 10 version Saw the problem?
Insider Build (xxxxx)
21H1 Yes
October 2020 Update (19042)
May 2020 Update (19041)
November 2019 Update (18363)
May 2019 Update (18362)
October 2018 Update (17763)
April 2018 Update (17134)
Fall Creators Update (16299)
Creators Update (15063)

#3373 I mention dim color before but nobody try to fix it

[FrayxRulez]

I remember a few of us mentioning the issue with dim Acrylic flyouts, as if the shadow layer renders on top - so not entirely sure if this is the same issue, or something new. As I understand it, WinUI is using DropDownShadows instead of the older Elevation based ThemeShadows

It's a new one, and it's a complete deal breaker for me, must be fixed asap: #5277

[akpapa]

I have a basic question:
Will the Store automatically update 2.6 runtime for current 2.5 UWP apps in the Store?
Or the developers need to rebuild their apps on 2.6 and republish them?

[mdtauk]

I have a basic question:
Will the Store automatically update 2.6 runtime for current 2.5 UWP apps in the Store?
Or the developers need to rebuild their apps on 2.6 and republish them?

Re-build I believe, versioning means apps can continue using older versions without their apps breaking potentially.

[akpapa]

Re-build I believe, versioning means apps can continue using older versions without their apps breaking potentially.

Thanks, that makes sense.
Why I'm asking this is because I read a doc about deployment of Project Reunion which now can be read only through web cache.

Deploy apps that use Project Reunion
19/03/2021

When a new version of the Project Reunion framework package is released, all apps are updated to the new version without themselves having to redistribute a copy. Windows updates to the newest version of frameworks as they are released, and apps will automatically reference the latest framework package version during relaunch. Older framework package versions will not be removed from the system until they are no longer running or being actively used by apps on the system.

I thought UWP apps work the same way.

[ghost]

Shouldn't tooltips use OverlayCornerRadius? All other floating controls have it.

[jevansaks]

Shouldn't tooltips use OverlayCornerRadius? All other floating controls have it.

They do, but only uplevel. The problem is that the dropshadow drawn pre-Windows 11 (that's implemented in the OS) doesn't look good with higher rounding value so we had to change the dropshadow implementation in Windows 11. But that means we can only use the larger rounding value on Windows 11 and higher. 😢

The good news is that in WinUI3 we'll be able to do the new rounding and shadows everywhere.

[under3415]

Next time, can RTM release be the same as the final pre-release? Makes no sense to have pre-releases and then deploy something else to production that looks different and breaks.

[zhuxb711]

It seems that the 2.6.2 pre-release and 2.7.0 pre-release will cause the failure when submit to MStore. Error code is 1201. Is there anyone encountered the same problem?

[crramirez]

Same here:

With the 2.6.2 release. My app UWP with desktop extensions, x64 and ARM64. The desktop part is in .NET 5. In fact since 2.6 I cannot publish in store. I must stay in 2.5

[zhuxb711]

@chingucoding @StephenLPeters @ranjeshj
Any ideas?

[zhuxb711]

Same here:

With the 2.6.2 release. My app UWP with desktop extensions, x64 and ARM64. The desktop part is in .NET 5. In fact since 2.6 I cannot publish in store. I must stay in 2.5

My App also have desktop extensions and it's in .Net Framework 4.8. I suspect that only apps with desktop extensions are affected. After all, I haven't seen anyone mention this in other issues.

[zhuxb711]

@crramirez How could I upgrade the desktop extensions to .Net 5 ? I got the error: There was no runtime pack for Microsoft.WindowsDesktop.App.WindowsFormsavailable for the specified RuntimeId "win10-arm" "win10-arm64"

[crramirez]

Pssf, I don't remember but it wasn't easy. The best way is to create a new .net 5 project and migrate the code. I can later today paste my project. My project is a console application to avoid WPF and Forms incompatibilities with ARM

[zhuxb711]

Pssf, I don't remember but it wasn't easy. The best way is to create a new .net 5 project and migrate the code. I can later today paste my project. My project is a console application to avoid WPF and Forms incompatibilities with ARM

Same as your project. My project is a console too but I don't know why it will reference that package

[zhuxb711]

@crramirez I created an issue #5768 for that submission problem, do you have any supplement?

[crramirez]

Excellent I'll check and add some comments if it is needed.

[crramirez]

@crramirez How could I upgrade the desktop extensions to .Net 5 ? I got the error: There was no runtime pack for Microsoft.WindowsDesktop.App.WindowsFormsavailable for the specified RuntimeId "win10-arm" "win10-arm64"

Hello, @zhuxb711 I completely forgot your question until today I checked your project and noticed that it is .Net Framework based. This is the project file of my Full Trust Project in .net 5: https://gist.github.com/crramirez/1e0bcbd5e590f54ffb26385343a1bd92

[zhuxb711]

@crramirez How could I upgrade the desktop extensions to .Net 5 ? I got the error: There was no runtime pack for Microsoft.WindowsDesktop.App.WindowsFormsavailable for the specified RuntimeId "win10-arm" "win10-arm64"

Hello, @zhuxb711 I completely forgot your question until today I checked your project and noticed that it is .Net Framework based. This is the project file of my Full Trust Project in .net 5: https://gist.github.com/crramirez/1e0bcbd5e590f54ffb26385343a1bd92

Never mind. I found something that might block my project to use .Net 5.

1. In .Net Framework, I could call every UWP API without considering Win10 version. But .Net 5 was limited.

2. My project rely on some API in System.Windows.Form (like Clipboard etc.). Since WinForm is not supposed on Arm currently. It means I have to give up ARM for now.

So .Net 5 is not an option for me currently. Thanks for help. Very appreciate!

[crramirez]

Remember that for .Net Framework when you put Any CPU for ARM it will generate x86 code and it will run in emulation mode. So, your application will run in ARM.
For me worked quite well for a while even though I had to make a workaround to call x64 processes from x86.

I wonder if you target Windows 11 as a minimum if it will generate x64 for ARM64 based on the emulation

[crramirez]

@zhuxb711 did you read this? https://devblogs.microsoft.com/dotnet/net-july-2021/

[zhuxb711]

Sorry I haven't test it on Win11 because Win11 is still in preview.

[zhuxb711]

@zhuxb711 did you read this? https://devblogs.microsoft.com/dotnet/net-july-2021/

Thanks for providing that article. I will try it again with .Net 5.0.8 SDK and let's see if that works for me.

[crramirez]

Sorry I haven't tested it on Win11 because Win11 is still in preview.

I use Virtual Machines for that, having our apps ready is important, also you can do this: https://boxofcables.dev/dual-boot-windows-and-windows-insiders-without-re-partitioning/ it works pretty well

[zhuxb711]

@crramirez I could use .Net 5 on ARM64 but ARM now. Microsoft.WindowsDesktop.App.WindowsForms on ARM is still not supported by .Net 5 currently

[zhuxb711]

@crramirez
I always got this error on publish the package (Debug is fine): NETSDK1083: The specified RuntimeIdentifier 'win-ARM64' is not recognized.
It seems that

<RuntimeIdentifiers></RuntimeIdentifiers> 

not work and VS always read the configuration from

<RuntimeIdentifier><RuntimeIdentifier>

[Panda-Sharp]

<RuntimeIdentifiers></RuntimeIdentifiers> 

did you try to totally remove <RuntimeIdentifiers></RuntimeIdentifiers> ?

[zhuxb711]

did you try to totally remove <RuntimeIdentifiers></RuntimeIdentifiers> ?

Remove it totally just the same as
exists with "win-ARM64" in it. It looks like the default value

[crramirez]

@zhuxb711 I have <RuntimeIdentifiers>win10-x64;win10-arm64;win-x64;win-arm64</RuntimeIdentifiers> check the project file that I shared above

[gabbybilka]

Check out #5889 for the latest WinUI 2.x update!