Avalonia.HotReload

This repository demonstrates how to use the hot reload feature in your Avalonia applications. The core idea is to rely on dotnet watch for rebuilding the projects from sources when any of the source files change, and to re-embed the updated controls into the Window without any need to press the 'Run' button by hands multiple times.

Getting Started

1. Create a new project based on a template from the Avalonia Templates repository. Or, use AvaloniaVS.
2. Install the Avalonia.ReactiveUI package into your newly created project:

# Execute this command from the project root.
dotnet add package Avalonia.ReactiveUI

3. Copy-paste the AvaloniaReloadingWindow.cs file into your newly created project.
4. Create a static method CreateReloadableControl in your the Program.cs file:

// This method will be the hot-reloadable composition root of your Avalonia application.
// Remember to use this signature! Otherwise the things won't work.
public static object CreateReloadableControl(Window window) => new TextBlock { Text = "Ok" };

5. Instantiate the AvaloniaReloadingWindow in your App.xaml.cs file as such:

// Obtain the assembly of the project by doing typeof on any type from the assembly.
// Then, instantiate the reloading Window class by passing the current project
// assembly to it, as well as the logger. Then, show the window. Using multiple 
// reloading windows isn't currently supported.
var assembly = typeof(App).Assembly;
var window = new AvaloniaReloadingWindow(assembly, Console.WriteLine);
window.Show();

6. Run your project using .NET CLI, as follows:

# Don't use the 'dotnet run' without the '--no-build' argument.
dotnet run --no-build

Important Note: Don't use the dotnet run command without the --no-build argument! Always use dotnet run --no-build, or dotnet build && dotnet run --no-build. Otherwise the executable file will get locked, see: https://github.com/dotnet/sdk/issues/11766

7. Done! Make some changes in the control returned by CreateReloadableControl, press Ctrl+S and the app will hot-reload. If you experience any issues with this setup, try cloning this repository and running the Avalonia.HotReload.Sample project by executing dotnet run --no-build from the project root.

Important Note: By default, dotnet watch tracks changes in .cs files only. In order to have hot-reload working with .xaml files, add the <Watch Include="**\*.xaml" /> directive to your .csproj file. See the project file in the demo project for more context.