XML processing instructions changed automatically (Xamarin)

[renao]

Hello everyone,

thanks for this great tool and its Visual Studio integration.

I love it, ever since I discovered it some months ago 👍

For me it worked like a charm until I tried to add some XAML-files to my Xamarin.Forms project, which have no code behind-files.

By definition I do need to declare the <?xaml-comp compile="true" ?> node at the top of the file, but unfortunately this line changes on save to <?Mapping compile="true" ?>, if the XAML Styler extension is activated in my Visual Studio 2017 Enterprise IDE .

I tried to find a configuration or a "ignore-list" to avoid automatically "excluding" my XAMLs from compilation - but without success.

Does this happen on purpose or is this just a bug?

I honestly do not understand the <?Mapping compile="true" ?> line at all - perhaps because of my bad searching skills? - so I don't want to blame your great tool, because of some missing knowledge here.

Anyway this could be some unwanted behaviour and I really want to reactivate XAML Styler in my projects 😉

It would be great, if you could have a look at this and let me know what the problem is/could be 👍

Example.xaml

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" ?>
<?xaml-comp compile="true" ?>
<ResourceDictionary
    xmlns="http://xamarin.com/schemas/2014/forms"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2009/xaml"
    xmlns:ui="clr-namespace:UI.Components">
    <ResourceDictionary.MergedDictionaries>
        <ResourceDictionary Source="Colors.xaml" />
        <ResourceDictionary Source="Fonts.xaml" />
    </ResourceDictionary.MergedDictionaries>

    <Style TargetType="{x:Type ui:PrimaryButton}">
        <Setter Property="BackgroundColor" Value="{StaticResource Color__Primary_Button}" />
        <Setter Property="TextColor" Value="{StaticResource Color__Primary_Button_Label}" />
    </Style>

    <Style TargetType="{x:Type ui:SecondaryButton}">
        <Setter Property="BackgroundColor" Value="{StaticResource Color__Secondary_Button}" />
        <Setter Property="TextColor" Value="{StaticResource Color__Secondary_Button_Label}" />
    </Style>

    <Style TargetType="{x:Type ui:IconToggleButton}" BasedOn="{StaticResource Font__Icon_Font}">
        <Setter Property="TextColor" Value="{StaticResource Color__Secondary_Button_Label}" />
        <Setter Property="HorizontalTextAlignment" Value="Center" />
        <Setter Property="VerticalTextAlignment" Value="Center"/>
    </Style>

</ResourceDictionary>

[grochocki]

Hmm, interesting. This appears to be a bug affecting Xamarin.

I tried to find a configuration or a "ignore-list" to avoid automatically "excluding" my XAMLs from compilation - but without success.

This is not currently possible, but it is on our backlog (#9 and #44). Even if this were available as a workaround, I think we would still want to address the underlying issue here IRT <?xaml-comp compile="true" ?>.

[renao]

Thank you for your response @grochocki

Perhaps I have some spare time around the upcoming holidays to dive a bit more into the structure of this project to prepare a "possible fix"-PR :-) 🥚 🐰

[grochocki]

Some useful resources on XML processing instructions for future reference:

• XML Processing Instructions
• XML Processing Instructions handling in XAML