Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5 Release Notes
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For information on the system requirements see the see Mac System Requirements and Mac Platform Targeting and Compatibility guides.
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What's New in Visual Studio 2019 for Mac
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac Releases
- May 14, 2020 - Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.6
- May 6, 2020 - Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.5
- April 21, 2020 - Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.4
- April 14, 2020 - Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.3
- April 7, 2020 - Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.2
- April 1, 2020 - Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.1
- March 16, 2020 - Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac Blog Posts
The Visual Studio Blog is the official source of product insight from the Visual Studio Engineering Team. You can find in-depth information about the Visual Studio 2019 for Mac releases in the following posts:
Release Highlights
In this release of Visual Studio 2019 for Mac we replaced our old Git implementation, refreshed our color palette and icons, and we addressed a number of issues with the debugger, test tools, and project system.
Known Issues
Refer to the Known Issues section.
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.6 (8.5.6.11)
released May 14, 2020
Shell and Tools
- We fixed an issue where the Properties Window is blank when using the dark theme on macOS 10.13 and older.
Web and Azure
- We updated to the latest .NET Core 3.1.4 release.
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.5 (8.5.5.7)
released May 6, 2020
Visual Studio for Mac 8.5 Service Release 5 fixes a handful of fatal errors that were reported.
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.4 (8.5.4.12)
released April 21, 2020
Visual Studio for Mac 8.5 Service Release 4 addresses the following:
- We fixed an issue where source code is broken when git changes are reverted.
- We fixed an issue where a file is marked as changed when switching to changes.
- We fixed an issue where the "api controller with entity framework" scaffold generates "MVC controller with entity framework".
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.3 (8.5.3.16)
released April 14, 2020
Visual Studio for Mac 8.5 Service Release 3 addresses the following:
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac has 100% CPU load when a Xamarin project is opened.
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac could not load ASP.NET Core solutions.
- We fixed an issue where NUnit 3 tests don't show up if using SetUpFixture.
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.2 (8.5.2.13)
released April 7, 2020
Visual Studio for Mac 8.5 Service Release 2 addresses the following:
- A user navigating with the keyboard can not navigate to the "Reset" button in the Xamarin Designer Property Panel.
- We fixed an issue where commits do not work in projects using Git worktree.
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac may become unresponsive when popping a stash in a project under Git.
- We fixed an issue where projects pushed to GitHub fail to show new files or directories.
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5.1 (8.5.1.42)
released April 1, 2020
This release includes the following updates:
- Support for Xcode 11.4.
- We fixed an issue with increased UI delays when working with Xamarin.iOS projects.
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac shows in current window on Mac when selected.
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac goes to background when switching virtual desktops.
- We fixed an issue where Version Control does not recognize newly added files in a folder.
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac tells me to install Command Line Tools but it's already installed.
Visual Studio 2019 for Mac version 8.5 (8.5.0.3183)
released March 23, 2020
New Features
Accessibility
This release of Visual Studio 2019 for Mac brings a refreshed color palette, new icons, and updated warning and error status messages. Color contrast ratios for text and icons have been increased to improve clarity. Visual Studio for Mac also now fully suports macOS High Contrast Mode.
In addition to the visual changes, this release of Visual Studio 2019 for Mac has made a number changes to increase overall accessibility of the IDE. These include:
- Improvements to focus order and visibility when using VoiceOver in the debugger, NuGet Package Manager and project options dialog.
- Areas previously inaccessible by keyboard navigation, such as the pin and eye icon, are now navigable by keyboard.
- Enhanced feedback from VoiceOver for debugger staus.
- After creating a project using the New Project Dialog, the IDE now accurately announces “project created” status message to VoiceOver users.
- Fixes to the NuGet Package manager that allow keyboard access to the Browse, Installed, Update and Consolidate tabs.
- VoiceOver now announces the selected version in the "New version" dropdown.
- VoiceOver now announces more information when using version control, the publish to Azure feature, and in a number of additional areas.
Version Control
We replaced our old Git implementation with a wrapper around the official Git command line client, which is already used by Visual Studio on Windows, in order to improve the overall performace and reliability of Git support in the IDE. The new Git support depends on the official git client. The recommended way to install Git is to install it as part of the Xcode Command Line Tools by running xcode-select --install in the Terminal app (Xcode does not need to be installed).
Debugger
- Function breakpoints can now be edited.
- We have improved stepping performance in .NET Core projects.
Editor
- We updated Light & Dark themes to match Visual Studio.
Installer
- We added a new item to the carousel to allow users to sign up for ASP.NET Core tips.
- We added support to implement CLI tools required by version control.
- We integrated error reporting to aid in improving future quality.
Web and Azure
- We bumped to the latest .NET Core release.
- We added authentication support in the New Project Dialog for ASP.NET Core projects.
- We added support for v2/v3 of Azure Functions runtime.
NuGet
- We bumped NuGet to 5.4.
Xamarin
- You can now see a hierarchy of your Xamarin.Forms controls in the Document Outline pane. On Windows, it can be opened with Ctrl+Alt+T (View > Other Windows > Document Outline). On Mac, you can open it via Views > Pads > Document Outline.
- When debugging multiple projects at the same time, you can now use XAML Hot Reload simultaneously on both targets. For example, you can use XAML Hot Reload to see how your XAML change looks on both an iOS and Android phone at the same time. Learn more about debugging multiple process in the Visual Studio 2019 documentation.
- You can now set the default iOS Designer in Visual Studio for Mac. Any changes made in the Xcode storyboard designer will be synchronized back to Visual Studio for Mac automatically.
- You can now apply Android resource changes at runtime using Android Apply Changes. This feature allows you to quickly see changes made to your Android resource files (XML layouts, drawables, etc) on an Android device or emulator without requiring the application to be restarted.
- You can now generate your own custom profiles when using startup tracing in your Android application. This provides you an even more performant startup experience with a minimal increase to APK size.
- You can now generate Xamarin.Android bindings against Kotlin libraries.
- You can now use the Google Manifest Merger when merging AndroidManifest.xml files in your Android projects. This allows you to customize how each manifest and its contents will be merged. For more details on rules that can be applied, please see Merge multiple manifest files.
- The option to use shared project has been removed when creating a new Xamarin.Forms app. New Xamarin.Forms apps will now use .NET Standard to ensure the best development experience.
Bug Fixes
Shell
- We fixed an issue where the start window shows when launching from Unity and cant be closed.
- We fixed an issue where right clicking a tab causes Visual Studio for Mac to crash
Editor
- We fixed an issue where Code Analysis ruleset is ignore and a bunch of conflicting warnings are presented by Visual Studio for Mac.
- We fixed an issue where method documentation is gone.
- We fixed an issue where there is no syntax highlighting and autocompletion in T4 templates.
- We fixed an issue where copy and paste did not work between certain types of files 1 2 3.
- We fixed an issue with color contrast during field renaming with the new theme.
- We improved VoiceOver accessibility for the Quick Fixes and Refactorings menu.
- We fixed a crash viewing certain file types on macOS 10.13.
Debugger
- We fixed an issue where value visualizer is always blank.
- We fixed an issue that caused inspecting nested variables in hierarchy to take longer than expected.
- We fixed an issue where viewing variables with async methods shows nothing.
- We fixed an issue where the debugger would not show variable inspection icons correctly.
- We fixed an issue that prevented watched expressions from being removed with the backspace key.
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac does not break on the line of an unhandled exception in .NET Core projects.
- We fixed an issue where the DataTip (variable inspect) font size looks small.
- We fixed an issue where the pin variable icon during debugging is initially missing.
- We fixed an issue where the UI buttons for stepping are slow to respond and make stepping feel very slow.
- We fixed an issue where values might not be able to be copied from the locals and watch pads.
- We fixed an issue where the .NET Core debugger would not show System.Drawing.Color values.
- We fixed an issue where the Attach to Process dialog shows no processes.
- We fixed an issue where the Debugger stops on lines without a breakpoint set (in multiple startup projects).
- We fixed an issue where watched expressions are removed after trying to rename them in the Watch Pad.
- We fixed an issue where saving edits from the Text visualizer during debugging does not save changes.
- We fixed an issue where the Locals pad is not updating after editing variable value in the visualizer.
- We fixed an issue that could cause spurious scrolling when stepping through code.
Project
- We fixed an issue where StyleCop rules are ignored.
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac automatically closes my solution claiming that a file is gone - but it is not.
- We fixed an issue where an occasional dialogue about mono-sgen32 not optimised for my Mac appears.
- We fixed an issue where creating a project with a name that already exists in one folder disables the dialog.
- We fixed an issue where “mono-sgen32” is not optimized for your Mac and needs to be updated.
- Report a problem dialog hidden when attaching a new file.
- Cmd + . file search now has to be pressed twice.
- Navigate to shortcut won't focus search text box.
- We fixed an issue where the Solution Explorer is showing duplicate files.
- We fixed an issue where deleting file from SDK style project adds unnecessary data into .csproj file.
- We fixed an issue where the wrong version of a multi-target project is referenced in a .NET Framework project.
- We fixed an issue where there is no IntelliSense for NUnit types when adding a new NUnit project to an existing solution.
- We fixed an issue that prevented a file from being removed from the project when the file was missing.
- We fixed an issue that would cause some MSBuild properties to not be fully evaluated.
- We fixed an issue where linked files could not be removed from the project.
- We fixed an issue where duplicate files are shown in the Solution window.
Version Control
- We fixed an issue where the version control file drop down is (partially) broken.
- We fixed an issue where libhostfxr.dylib is not signed.
- We fixed an issue where the status of modified files was not updated after saving or reverting changes.
- We fixed an issue with the overall performance when working with solutions inside a git repository.
- We fixed an issue with macOS continously prompting to install Xcode command line tools.
- We fixed an issue where Git "Authors" incorrectly shows the 1st line as modified.
- We fixed an issue where renaming a file can cause a UI hang.
- We fixed an issue where Switch to Branch menu is missing.
- We fixed an issue where a new file was not shown in the Status View if it was not added/staged manually.
- We fixed an issue where there are issues with BOM in the Status View diff.
Web Tools
- We fixed an issue where custom parameters do not persist.
- We fixed an issue where .NET Core web application MVC template creates multiple launchSettings.json and appsettings.json files.
- We fixed an issue where Visual Studio for Mac 2019 has no controller scaffolding with views.
- We fixed an issue where launchSettings.json are changed on save.
NuGet
- We fixed an issue where unable to get repository signature information for source.
- We fixed an issue where NuGets are not refreshing.
Test Tools
- We fixed an issue where the test heirarchy is jumbled and breaks namespace names.
- We fixed an issue with weird nesting in the "Unit Tests" pad.
- We fixed an issue that can cause test discovery to fail.
- We fixed some additional nested issues related to weird nesting in "Unit Tests" explorer/window.
Known Issues
- If you run into node-gyp build errors with the ASP.NET Core React and Angular SPA project templates then see the node-gyp installation notes for workarounds.
Feedback & Suggestions
We would love to hear from you! You can report a problem through the Report a Problem option in Visual Studio for Mac IDE. You can track your feedback, including suggestions, in the Developer Community portal.