.NET 6 Support Update
With .NET 6 right around the corner, we wanted to share the plans for our upcoming 2021 v3 release. .NET 6 will finish the unification of .NET, such as expanding to iOS and Android with MAUI and support for AOT and desktop in Blazor, as well as performance improvements.
We unveiled our .NET 5 migration plan for our WinForms and WPF controls around this time last year.
This migration process involved implementing new .NET 5-based libraries for our most popular controls first and then moving down the list. Moving forward, we will use the .NET 5 base to support all future versions of .NET.
Of course, we will continue to support and maintain .NET Framework 4.5+ simultaneously, and we still provide some older versions under maintenance mode.
Read on to find out more about our .NET 6 support plans for each platform.
Our .NET 6 Support Plans
We are committed to supporting .NET 6 across all ComponentOne platforms at the time of release. With the latest .NET 6 release candidate, you can already use our .NET 5 libraries with .NET 6 applications with no significant issues at runtime.
If you're already working with .NET 6, you can safely use the .NET 5 version of our libraries, and they will seamlessly update to .NET 6 when we release our 2021 v3 release on December 1st, 2021. For the best design-time experience, we strongly recommend updating to Visual Studio 2022 if you haven't already.
WinForms and WPF
For 2021 v3, we will introduce .NET 6-based libraries for WinForms and WPF controls. These will include some new controls and features based upon our .NET 5 release schedule, including C1TrueDBGrid.
We will also ship an updated .NET 5 set of controls. 2021 v3 is likely to be the last .NET 5 release with new controls and features, as we shift 100% to supporting .NET 6 after v3. In 2022, the .NET 5 version will likely only include bug fixes to existing controls, so you can continue maintaining .NET 5 apps.
WinUI
The 2021 v3 release will include an official version of our new WinUI controls - which are currently beta. These WinUI 3 controls will be based on .NET 6 and the WindowsAppSDK.
MAUI
We will also introduce a preview of some MAUI controls - FlexGrid and Calendar. As Microsoft recently announced, MAUI will not officially release with .NET 6 but remain as a preview. Our controls for MAUI will start slow and stay on track with Microsoft's release plan.
Blazor
For Blazor, we will ship two versions: .NET Core 3.1 and .NET 6. The benefit of switching to .NET 6 is that you will no longer need to manually add the references to scripts and JavaScript files for each control library.
This quality-of-life improvement was added in .NET 5, and we will now take advantage of it with .NET 6 libraries.
ASP.NET Core and Data Services
Our ASP.NET Core MVC and data services libraries will remain based on .NET Core 3.1 or .NET Standard 2. This means that they will all work in .NET 5 or .NET 6 applications.
What Are Your .NET 6 Migration Plans?
Last month, we asked our site users about their .NET 6 migration plans. We're happy to share the results with the community (shown below).
Based on your feedback of over 200 submissions, we see most developers are either migrating to .NET 6 (39%) or sticking with .NET Framework (31%). Fewer developers are sticking with .NET 5 (19%).
As Microsoft has stated, .NET 6 and even-numbered versions will be LTS (long-term support), which means .NET 5 applications will need to be updated eventually.
We're interested to hear your development plans and what you are looking to see with ComponentOne and .NET 6. Leave your comments below!
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