Free Windows Development Tools for Windows Universal Apps and More!

It’s been no secret that Microsoft has been taking a beating in the mobile realm.  Windows 10 mobile has only been released on a handful of phones so far with users of specific Lumia models waiting for the promised update still from 8.1 Denim.

Back in February they announced they were going to be purchasing Xamarin, a company that helps software developers write applications for mobile devices.  The apparent objective is to encourage broad development of universal windows apps which reportedly should allow the same app to run on the desktop, tablet and phone utilizing the same codebase.

The Xamarin software is available free from Microsoft here.  The software is available for Mac as Xamarin Studio Community and is a full-featured IDE allowing for the development for Android and IOS apps.  The Windows version is Visual Studio Community and allows for the development of Android, IOS and Windows apps, web apps and cloud services.