MVX=0F Side Note: Adding a Splash Screen

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I received some feedback on my previous post on setting up MvvmCross for Xamarin.Forms, asking how to add a splash screen to the Android Forms application. In the post MVX=0 I converted the MainActivity that comes as part of the standard Xamarin Android project into a SplashScreen but when it came to the Android project for Xamarin.Forms I left it without a splash screen.

Luckily adding a splash screen is really easy, so let’s add one to the Forms.Droid project:

  1. Copy the SplashScreen.axml from the /Resources/layout folder in the FirstDemo.Droid project into the /Resources/layout folder in the Forms.Droid project
  2. Remove “MainLauncher = true” from the Activity attribute on the MainActivity
  3. Change the MainActivity inheritance:
    public class MainActivity : MvxFormsAppCompatActivity<MainViewModel>


  4. Add a new class, SplashScreen.cs:
    [Activity(Label = “FirstDemo.Forms.Splash”, Theme = “@style/MainTheme”, MainLauncher = true, NoHistory = true)]
    public class SplashScreen : MvxFormsSplashScreenAppCompatActivity<MvxFormsAndroidSetup<Core.App, App>, Core.App, App>
    {
         public SplashScreen() : base(Resource.Layout.SplashScreen)
         {
         }


    5.     protected override void RunAppStart(Bundle bundle)
         {
             StartActivity(typeof(MainActivity));
             base.RunAppStart(bundle);
         }
    }

And there you have it – the Android Xamarin.Forms project will launch with a splash screen before redirecting to the MainActivity which will host the Xamarin.Forms content.

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