Xamarin now free (and supposedly open source)

I've just tried il2cpp on Android. Just basic scenario: tiny helloworld project with a button that throws exception. The build time was over 6 minutes for a couple of scripts and no graphic assets. Compared to few seconds on Mono 2 backend. And `Debug.LogWarning(ex.StackTrace);` produces empty string in `adb`. No exception stack trace, can you imagine this?

It's great that il2cpp makes the life easier for developers supporting the bazillion of platforms. But it also would be nice if it made the life easier for users.

 

But they will, won't they? I'm just impressed by your recent article on debugging, and I'm afraid very much to encounter such issues in production with no managed exceptions available.

“.NET profile upgrade” is the main thing that makes me F5 Unity blog page awaiting for news on it. But I'd rather prefer standard Framework (.NET/Xamarin) than brave new tool chain. I'm usually enthusiastic on developing of new transpilers, runtimes and so on. But at the moment I'm a little bit sceptical on necessity of il2cpp and its reliability.

 

This. Again...

 

Xbox One supports IL2CPP builds now? Is it optional or always IL2CPP?

 

It's sad how many times this comes up as a defense of Unity.

 

Because it was yesterday when I've read about Xenko first time. It looks immature, with small community. But I'll consider moving there after investigation.

 

So quick question, there's a bug that's been reported by two of my customers, any built in Unity3D struct types (Vector3, Vector2, Vector4, Matrix4x4, Quaternion, Resolution, etc) are failing to deserialize with my asset with AOT errors but only on Xbox One. I think the first time this was reported was over a year ago... I've worked around it by creating custom converters. Do you know if this issue also applies to IL2CPP on Xbox One or is it strictly the Mono implementation? The second customer reached out to the xbox team a week ago... I don't have either bug number.

 

Not even remotely true. Every 1 or 2 person team making small mobile games, maybe. And now that Xamarin is free (the topic of this thread), that's going to change. UNLESS Unity steps up their game. But it seems the Unity Defenders would rather keep the status quo and not have Unity improve itself.

 

It's not an attempt to defend Unity. If any game engine were to fail to meet my needs then I would use another. It isn't like I'm not always investigating the competition either. I have Unreal 4 and CryEngine V on my computer right now.

Once again why would you stick to an engine that failed to meet your expectations if the competition is able to?

 

Who knows, maybe your feedback could change something?

 

Except the feedback taking place right now won't. Unity will continue progressing along with IL2CPP.

 

Come on now. A person mentions one thing in a competing engine that they think is an advantage over Unity, and you think they should switch engines?

It's not hard to come up with reasoning why someone might not drop everything and switch engines as soon as they find something they don't like about the engine they're using.

 

So the whole topic is irrelevant to Unity: Xamarin is free now but this won't affect Unity in any way because they're making their own CLR replacement.

 

Why do you feel like they should continue using an engine that isn't meeting their needs?

I can understand if you're mid-project and cannot afford to switch, but at the same time I've known people who have.

Right, because the path of IL2CPP is somehow completely detrimental despite statements of the opposite from the Unity developers themselves.

Last time I checked the Common Language Runtime was but a single part of the Mono framework. Xamarin being free is definitely an advantage to them but it isn't sufficient by itself. Thus why development of IL2CPP is continuing.

 

You know, switching an engine may require switching the employer. My personal need — is to be satisfied while programming. And I'm revisiting trade-offs.

 

Or it could involve convincing them to switch engines for future projects.

Fortunately in the long term it this whole discussion will be moot. We'll have both IL2CPP and newer framework releases.

 

Good I'll have him give it a try. It wasn't all structs by the way, only the structs in UnityEngine that were causing the problem. We could create our own structs that mirrored the structure and they would work just fine.

 

Yes, I can try this too Unfortunately product owners tend to be conservative.

 

Who said anything about not meeting needs? Pointing out an advantage of another engine doesn't automatically mean Unity isn't meeting basic needs. Why didn't you discuss the point (that cross-platformness could be considered a drawback)?

That's not what I meant. But since you mention it, here's a relevant post from a Unity developer:

Which suggests that if there were fewer platforms, specifically just the platforms that Xamarin already supports, a .NET upgrade could happen sooner and without IL2CPP.

I'm not saying I think they should do that. But for me, a .NET upgrade is far more important than support for Tizen and Smart TVs.

 

Yeah, who even play games on smart TVs (which has to be most inconvenient thing to do by the way). And Tizen? I've never seen any smartphone or tablet with it. Even Samsung, which is one of main companies developing it is using Android for their every popular product, like Galaxy devices.

Also, since xb360 isn't produced anymore, support for it could go away as well.

 

Do you mean “NIH syndrome”?

 

How about WebGL? Did you know that both Smart TVs and Tizen use HTML5 for applications? Support for those esoteric platforms may seem unusual but it isn't that strange once you realize that the majority of the effort in supporting them is covered by supporting WebGL.

 

Yeah, the web platform is important for a significant number of us.

I don't care what web technology is developed. I just want it so my games can be played in web browsers. Preferably without the user needing to download anything.

 

That's splendid news. Will unity upgrade the mono version to the latest soon? Please say yes.

 

“So the whole topic is irrelevant to Unity: Xamarin is free now but this won't affect Unity in any way because they're making their own CLR replacement.”

Opensourcing Xamarin doesn't change anything: il2cpp completion is still prerequisite for updating compiler and libraries. And it won't be shipped until it's completed for all of supported platforms.

Until then please enjoy your massive cross-platformness while waiting for unknown ETA.

 

WOW! Now that mono 4 is available for free, how IL2CPP development is justified? Xamarin is now part of Microsoft and that clears every doubt about trusting into it. So Unity still wants to go its own direction?

I mean OK, IL2CPP was a good move when UT was stuck with mono 2.6.5 and its horrid performance. But when a modern version of mono is available that is open source, widely used and properly tested and reliable what makes IL2CPP, a new, immature, proprietary technology a better investment? Is it proven that IL2CPP has better performance than mono 4?

 

Here is a summary by Tautvydas: http://forum.unity3d.com/threads/xa...osedly-open-source.395040/page-3#post-2580763

 

Why do you people keep repeating the same questions when they have been answered several times and by Unity people?

 

That makes sense. Then we have to wait and see when it will beat mono on PC.

 

They were too lazy to read the whole thread.

 

Not all of them (at least for me).

“Interop performance”? Have you read “10000 UPDATE() CALLS” blog post? Some people dismiss using Unity `Update()` at all for their scripts, replacing them by virtual `MyUpdate()`; so there is the only call to Unity `Update()` in `MyGameLoop` script, which invokes the list of `MyUpdatable`s. That's just to avoid interop calls and marshalling on every update. So maybe it's better for engine to move some logic to managed side? In this case moving from native to managed can actually boost performance, even if it sounds paradoxically. It is not Mono fault that there is so much interop in Unity Engine. As far as I understood, there are no such issues in Xenko.

“Stability” and “Maintainability and customizability”? Does this relate to 8-years-old Mono or to up-to-date Xamarin?

“Managed code performance”? What if a lot of people are just satisfied with current performance? More over Xamarin may improve this. And il2cpp implies actually worse build time. At least because compiling C++ is much slower than C#, absolutely regardless of actual compilers: Clang, Microsoft, GCC vs. Roslyn, Mono, etc. And this time is added to compiling C# to IL. Not mentioning intermediate conversions on the way from IL to C++.

 

Interop performance problems are caused by the overhead of two or more frameworks communicating. Unity has it because the core engine is written in C++ but the scripting is C#. Xenko doesn't have it because it's written in the same language it uses for scripting.

Yes, that's an alternative to IL2CPP, but you'll lose the performance boosts brought by IL2CPP.

 

I understand this. Core engine being written in C++ does not sound as advantage for me. It can gain more performance, but loses it for interop. It doesn't make much sense for me to go to native code for every API call.

 

Right, but IL2CPP eliminates the interop performance penalty in addition to giving you higher performance due to C++. Yet again it's a matter of short term benefits versus long term benefits. Short term of adopting the path Xenko took is you'll have the framework updated sooner but you'll lose the long term performance boost of IL2CPP.

 

It's a long thread, you know.

I'm interested to read that.

 

I just mean, that mentioned reason is not Mono drawback, but rather consequence of architectural decision. And adding C++ by itself does not guarantee noticeable performance boost.

I'd prefer Unity to just plug in Xamarin to those popular platforms where Xamarin is available. Instead of solving artificial design problems, which don't actually bother me as user that much. (They are good to be solved but not by sacrificing the overall usability and time.)

 

Just open each page and scroll down till you see the Unity developer tag.

 

Except it isn't simply adding C++. It's replacing the portion that requires interop with one that does not. Additionally you have to take into consideration that C++ compilers are extremely good at optimizing code.

 

And extremely slow.

Actually, we already use il2cpp (have to) for iOS edition of our game. (I'm focused on Android and WSA versions, so don't know all the details.) My colleague say they didn't notice any significant performance boost, on the other hand they didn't measure it explicitly. I don't deny probable performance gain, especially after polishing il2cpp; just don't tend to overestimate it.

 

Only at the compiling stage.

 

Doesn't joining .NET Foundation mean possible cooperation in development of Xamarin? Pull requests and so on?

 

How does IL2CPP compare to .NET Native? I know .NET Native is specific to UWP, but it does seem more mature and stable. I was curious as to whether it could be used to improve IL2CPP.

 

Interesting, how Xenko managed to utilize Xamarin on Android as is, without rewriting codegen. Cannot find time to try it :-` Maybe on weekend.