Specifically, the following properties can be used there:

• Graphics.FontName
• Graphics.FontSize
• Graphics.FontAscent

These properties are known from other Xojo targets (e.g. Desktop), but are not part of the official mobile API and are not shown in Autocomplete. They cannot be used outside of this event.

In contrast, the mobile API property Graphics.Font cannot be used within the DrawControlInLayoutEditor event. The usage is strictly limited to the DrawControlInLayoutEditor event. Using these properties in runtime code will result in errors.

These properties allow for more accurate text rendering in the layout editor, for example in custom controls where font metrics need to be considered.

Although these properties are not part of the mobile API, they can be used selectively within the layout editor context.

This code will work fine in your mobile control’s DrawControlInLayoutEditor event:

Var s As String = "Happy coding!"
Var x As Double = g.Width / 2 - g.TextWidth(s) / 2
Var y As Double = g.Height / 2 - g.TextHeight / 2 + g.FontAscent

g.DrawingColor = Color.Red
g.DrawOval(0, 0, g.Width, g.Height)

g.DrawingColor = TextColor
g.Bold = True
g.FontName = "Times New Roman"
g.FontSize = 16
g.DrawText(s, x, y)

Happy coding!

Martin T. is a Xojo MVP and has been very involved in testing Android support.

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Though he started his development journey on Windows machines, after a seven-year spell at SAIC Ltd. (Science Applications International Corp), Paul decided he wanted to move to Apple computers and started looking for a VB/Access replacement. That’s how he discovered Xojo and built a suite of applications that managed multiple aspects of his hire-boat business, overseeing 17 boats on the British Canal System. Even in retirement, he remains actively coding in 2026.

Mac, Windows or Linux?

Mac.

How did you find Xojo? And when did you start using Xojo?

I started in 2000 with RealBASIC. I needed a database/programming combination to run my boat yard and hire boat business on the British Canal system. I went for RealBASIC and FrontBase database, it was fast reliable and very stable. It enabled me to create a suite of about 10 programs for renting the boats, doing the maintenance, tracking sales and running the cafe. The applications managed the bookings for 17 boats which operated on a varied pattern of 3, 4, 7 and 14 night holidays. The progams stored the bookings, printed the legal documents required at the start of each trip and logged the fuel usage and engineering routines.

Do you earn a living with Xojo?

No, but my business would not have run without it.

Xojo isn’t the only tool in your kit. What is a piece of software more people should know about?

A good knowledge of a database which interfaces well with Xojo is useful. I interfaced my early applications with FrontBase but the plugin does not exist now. I moved to PostgresSQL, it was a bit different at first, but the new AddROW instruction in Xojo has really streamlined my apps.

Which three Xojo language features or framework capabilities do you find yourself relying/using on the most?

My three main items are Listbox, Graphics – items loading pictures and drawing on top of the picture, and the database plugins. Shame we lost FrontBase but PostgreSQL seems to suite me almost as well.

What do you build with it now?

I currently help a very good friend who owns a canal boat marina in the heart of the UK, sadly he uses Windows machines and some rather clunky Access database applications, I would love to get my hands on them!

How would you explain your most recent project to a new developer?

I wanted to maintain a visual display of the boats in a marina and track the ownership and movements of the boats. Initially, I created a Listbox to display the database table which allowed me to count and record vessel details. But I wanted to visualise the position and load it as a picture. Using the DesktopBevelButton, I recorded the position on the plan. They are the red and green squares along the edge of the piers and clicking on an individual location fetches the boat data. I am now looking to locate all the technical resources electric and water points and pontoon detail for our service and engineering crew.

Do you use it for any hobbies?

At nearly 80 I just enjoy the mental exercise, but I still build games for my granddaughter and things to help at the office where I do some administration. I retired and sold the business, but I do some part-time work at a canal marina where we live. Using Xojo and PostgreSQL I am developing a visual boat management system. We moor nearly 200 boats of varying lengths on pontoons of varying lengths! A real juggling job!

What’s your biggest Xojo success?

Sticking with it for such a long time, all through changing RECORDSET to ROWSET, and how simple INSTR grew. I mastered the new graphics methods after much effort – but I did it!

If you were introducing Xojo to a friend, which three words would you use to describe it?

Flexible, fast with great technical backup when you need it.

Thank you to Paul Garfield for answering questions and sharing his Xojo experience with the community. If you have an app, a project or a person you want to see featured in Spotlight On, tell us about it!

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In total, more than 60 new declares have been added for MobileSlider, allowing you to control virtually every UI parameter of the control—whether it’s the shape of the thumb, its color, the track colors (both for the active/left and inactive/right portions), and much more. You can also set the step size, similar to what you’re used to on the desktop.

Just take a look at the updated Android Design Extensions demo app and try it out.

Feel free to take a look at the developer repository, create feature requests, and provide feedback on extending this extension library. I’m happy to receive any voluntary financial support for the work I’ve done so far, which you are welcome to share here. You can download the project with many examples at https://github.com/XojoGermany/AndroidDesignExtensions.

Happy coding!

Martin T. is a Xojo MVP and has been very involved in testing Android support.

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First, I’m going to create a headless desktop application. A console application would work, but shows a command box.

In the Xojo IDE, create a new desktop project and delete Window1 and MainMenuBar. Then add the Opening Event Handler to App and add this code:

Self.AllowAutoQuit = True

This will allow the application to quit when done.

Add the DocumentOpened Event Handler to App and add this code:

If item _ ' Using item
 .NativePath _ ' property NativePath
 .NthField(":", 1) <> "AlertDemo" Then ' Compare the value left of the ":"
 Return ' If invalid return (quit)
End If
Var alert As String ' Define the variable
alert = item _ ' Using Item
 .NativePath _ ' property NativePath
 .NthField(":", 2) ' Extract the contents to the right of the ":"

alert = DecodeURLComponent(alert) ' Convert the content to plain text
MessageBox(alert) ' Show the alert
' The app will now quit

To test you can select Shared in Build Settings.

And enter a value into Command Line Arguments:

Running the app in debug mode will show:

Now build the project and create an installer using Inno Setup.

[Setup]
AppId={{B4D9ABDA-9F58-4FE0-A5F3-3E39C28EAB59}
AppName=Alert Demo
AppVersion=1.0
DefaultDirName={commonpf64}\Axis Direct Ltd\Alert Demo
DefaultGroupName=Axis Direct
OutputDir=C:\Xojo Projects\Alert Demo\Installer
OutputBaseFilename=AlertDemoInstaller
Compression=lzma
SolidCompression=yes
ChangesEnvironment=yes
[Languages]
Name: "english"; MessagesFile: "compiler:Default.isl"
[Tasks]
[Dirs]
Name: "{app}\Alert Demo Libs"
[Files]
Source: "C:\Xojo Projects\Alert Demo\Project\Builds - Alert
Demo\Windows 64 bit\Alert Demo*"; DestDir: "{app}"; Flags:
ignoreversion
Source: "C:\Xojo Projects\Alert Demo\Project\Builds - Alert
Demo\Windows 64 bit\Alert Demo\Alert Demo Libs*"; DestDir:
"{app}\Alert Demo Libs"; Flags: ignoreversion
[Icons]
[Run]
[Registry]
Root: HKCR; Subkey: "AlertDemo"; Flags: uninsdeletekey
Root: HKCR; Subkey: "AlertDemo"; ValueType: "String";
ValueData: "URL:AlertDemo Protocol"; Flags: uninsdeletekey
Root: HKCR; Subkey: "AlertDemo"; ValueName: "URL Protocol";
ValueType: "String"; ValueData: ""; Flags: uninsdeletekey
Root: HKCR; Subkey: "AlertDemo\shell"; Flags: uninsdeletekey
Root: HKCR; Subkey: "AlertDemo\shell\open"; Flags:
uninsdeletekey
Root: HKCR; Subkey: "AlertDemo\shell\open\command"; Flags:
uninsdeletekey
Root: HKCR; Subkey: "AlertDemo\shell\open\command";
ValueType: String; ValueData: "{app}\Alert Demo.exe %1";
Flags: uninsdeletekey

The registry section creates the registry entries per William’s blog post.

Now that the application Is installed, we’ll look at the Web Application. For the sake of testing, I’m just adding a Button to a WebPage and adding the following code into the pressed event.

Var s As String = "Hello World"
Var Alert As String
Alert = EncodeURLComponent(s) ' Make the string URL safe
GoToURL("AlertDemo:" + Alert, True) ' Launch the app in a new tab

And that is it!

For printing a docket, I would pass a unique identifier for the transaction using this method then access the data using URLConnection & HandleURL.

Wayne Golding has been a Xojo developer since 2005 and is a Xojo MVP. He operates the IT Company Axis Direct Ltd which primarily develops applications using Xojo that integrate with Xero www.xero.com. Wayne’s hobby is robotics where he uses Xojo to build applications for his Raspberry Pi, often implementing IoT for remote control.

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What Is Conditional Compilation?

Conditional compilation allows you to include or completely exclude sections of code from the final application based on a condition. Unlike an If statement at runtime, this decision is made at compile time. Code excluded through conditional compilation simply does not exist in the compiled application.

#If False – Completely Excluding Code

#If False
  MessageBox("This line will never be compiled")
  Var result As Integer = DoSomething()
#EndIf

When the condition is False, the entire block is ignored by the compiler. It is not compiled, not included in the application, and not even checked for syntax errors. The code is effectively invisible to the compiler.

Why Not Just Comment It Out?

At first glance, #If False seems to do the same thing as a comment. But there are key differences:

1. Nested Comments Are No Problem

If a code block already contains comments, commenting out the entire block quickly becomes messy:

' Var x As Integer = 42 ' Default value
' Var y As Integer = x * 2 ' double it
' ' This is already a comment

With #If False, everything stays clean:

#If False
  Var x As Integer = 42 ' Default value
  Var y As Integer = x * 2 ' double it
  ' This is already a comment
#EndIf

2. Incomplete or Broken Code

Sometimes you want to keep an unfinished code draft without it preventing the build. Since the compiler completely skips the contents of an #If False block, the code inside may even contain syntax errors:

#If False
  ' Experimental approach – not finished yet
  Var data As  = LoadFromServer(
  ProcessResult(data
#EndIf

This code would be useless as a comment because you’d have to comment out each line individually. With #If False, it’s safely stored away.

3. Quickly Disabling Large Code Blocks

For larger sections, #If False / #EndIf is far more practical than prefixing every line with '. Plus, the block can be reactivated instantly by simply changing False to True.

#If True – Always Including Code

#If True
  MessageBox("This line will always be compiled")
#EndIf

An #If True block is always compiled — it behaves identically to regular code. This might sound useless at first, but it does have practical applications.

When Is #If True Useful?

1. Quick Toggling During Development

Imagine you’re working on a feature and want to quickly enable or disable certain code sections:

#If True ' <- Set to False to disable the new feature
  ' New feature
  Var service As New CloudSyncService
  service.SyncNow()
#EndIf

By simply changing True to False, you can disable the feature without deleting or commenting out any code.

2. Placeholder for Future Conditions

Sometimes you already know that a code section will later be tied to a condition — such as a platform or build type. With #If True, you can prepare the structure in advance:

#If True ' TODO: Change to TargetMacOS once Windows alternative is ready
  Var folderPath As String = SpecialFolder.Applications.NativePath
#EndIf

3. Visual Code Grouping

In longer methods, #If True can serve as a visual structural block to highlight related code:

#If True ' --- Initialization ---
  Var db As New SQLiteDatabase
  db.DatabaseFile = dbFile
  db.Connect
#EndIf

#If True ' --- Load data ---
  Var rs As RowSet = db.SelectSQL("SELECT * FROM users")
#EndIf

Defining Custom Compiler Constants

Xojo also allows you to define your own constants for conditional compilation.

#If kEnableLogging
  WriteToLog("Application started")
#EndIf

This lets you control features or debug functionality centrally through a constant without having to modify the code itself.

Best Practices

1. #If False instead of mass comments: For larger code blocks that need to be temporarily disabled, #If False is the cleaner solution.
2. Add a comment: Always document why a block is disabled:

#If False ' Disabled until bug #1234 is fixed
  ProcessCriticalData()
 #EndIf

3. Don’t use permanently: #If False blocks should not remain in the code indefinitely. If the code is no longer needed, remove it. If it is needed, activate it.
4. Prefer platform directives: When dealing with platform-specific code, use the specific constants (TargetMacOS, TargetWindows, etc.) instead of #If True or #If False.
5. Avoid deep nesting: While nested #If blocks are possible, use them sparingly as they quickly reduce readability.

Conclusion

#If False and #If True are simple yet powerful tools for everyday Xojo development. They offer a cleaner alternative to commenting out large code blocks, enable quick feature toggling during development, and lay the groundwork for a structured, cross-platform codebase. Used thoughtfully, they save time and help you stay organized — even in larger projects.

If you want to automatically convert a selection into a #If/#EndIf block, you can do so via the context menu: “Wrap In > #If / #EndIf”

Happy coding.

Martin T. is a Xojo MVP and has been very involved in testing Android support.

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That’s why Xojo is still here: relentless adaptation.

Back when Xojo was REALbasic, version 1.0 only supported MacOS 8/9 and the 68000 and PowerPC processors. Since then we have seen countless changes in the computer technology landscape. Classic MacOS, Windows NT, Windows 95, Internet Explorer 6, Early versions of GTK on Linux, diskettes, and spinning hard drives are now ancient technology.

Xojo itself has changed dramatically over time as well. Though the basic idea of it, that you should be able to quickly and easily both learn Xojo and build apps, has not changed. Some code from an example project back then would be recognizable to a Xojo user today. Assigning variables, conditional statements, loops, even many classes like Graphics, FolderItem, TextInputStream, would all look familiar. That said, almost everything else has changed:

• The IDE was originally written in C++. It is now written in Xojo.
• There entire Xojo framework was originally written in C++. Today it’s a big blend of languages including quite a bit of Xojo.
• It originally had a single pass compiler. The entire compilation process has been rewritten. It is a modern, two-pass system that uses LLVM as its backend.
• REALbasic v1 could only produce desktop apps for MacOS 8 and 9 running on 68000 and PowerPC processors. Today, Xojo supports x86 and ARM processors, desktop apps for Linux, MacOS and Windows, mobile apps for Android and iOS and web apps.
• The documentation was originally almost entirely in printed form. It cost $30, weighed 49 ounces (just over 3 lbs.) and we shipped it to you right from our office. Now, the documentation is all online.
• The way users reported bugs and made feature requests has changed several times over the years.
• The community formed in mailing lists, and occasional Xojo events, now exists on our online forum.

And that adaption continues. We improve the frameworks with each release. We have added the ability to build Libraries. We are working on making web apps more responsive. We are continuing our march towards updating the Windows framework to WinUI. We are making changes to the Xojo IDE so that you can use AI tools such as Anthropic’s Claude Code, Google’s Gemini Code Assist, and Open.AI’s Codex, which, coincidentally, was almost the name we chose for what is now Xojo.

Companies survive by adapting, and Xojo, Inc. is no exception. Over the years we’ve changed everything from offices, personnel, and policies. While the team has changed over the years, many members have been with the company a very long time. In the tech industry, the average turnover is 2 to 3 years. Over the last 30 years, our average turnover is 7 years. Counting current team members, however, it’s a whopping 16.6 years! And among the current engineering team, there are 136 person-years of development on Xojo. We started working out of my apartment, then my house and then into an office here in Austin, Texas. Over time, about half of us found we were working from home a lot, so we decided to go entirely remote in 2008. We have changed many of our internal policies to make Xojo a great place to work. Every member of the Xojo team works so well together that it makes coming to work every day genuinely rewarding.

In general, only about 5% of businesses last 30 years. In tech it’s closer to 1%. It’s an honor to be a member of the tech industry’s 1% club!

What drives all of us at Xojo is helping you turn what started as an idea, into reality. We couldn’t have done it without all the dedicated Xojo users. That some of you have been with us for the entire journey, so far, is especially gratifying.

On behalf of the entire team, thank you for making Xojo possible.

Geoff Perlman is the Founder and CEO of Xojo. When he’s not leading the Xojo team he can be found playing drums in Austin, Texas and spending time with his family.

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The work Carsten does was brought to my attention when he replied to one of our posts on Facebook talking about Xojo’s SerialConnection. Carsten said he used SerialConnection to open and monitor cash drawers in his Xojo-written ERP, AWARD+. Read how Carsten has used Xojo alongside PostgreSQL, MBS DynaPDF, and other tools for the last 25 years.

Mac, Windows or Linux?

All of them.

How would you explain your most recent project to a new developer?

We often have to keep up to new legal requirements here in the EU, so the last part was the integration of electronic invoices. For doing this we had to gather information about the laws, do’s and dont’s and required tools. We had to build a parser and creator for the XML part (a colleague of mine did most of that job in Xojo) and to integrate that into our module for creating and mailing invoices (that is my job). To make things easier, we often accessed existing partial solutions like MBS DynaPDF and Ghostscript to build a required PDF/A.

What is something that has surprised you about coding in the last 5 years?

I am very surprised that still so many people insist on using C or C++. It’s like driving an old steam locomotive instead of a new truck. In our time, solutions have to be done very fast and they don’t last forever. So an IDE like Xojo is faster for prototyping or building. Especially for a small customer base or even individual development.

Xojo isn’t the only tool in your kit. What is a piece of software more people should know about?

The software we make heavy use of is PostgreSQL. And we use Git. Do not try to work in a team without having something like Git. Even a single developer benefits from versioning and backups when using a hub. We use every command-line program that may help us, to name a few: ImageMagick, SIPs, qlmanage, Ghostscript and curl.

Which three Xojo language features or framework capabilities do you find yourself relying/using on the most?

• PostgreSqlPlugin
• AutoComplete and other integrated help
• Navigation inside code editor like “Go to Function” using ContextualMenu

How did you find Xojo? And when did you start using Xojo?

I used GFA Basic on Amiga and was looking for something similar for Apple Macintosh. Maybe started with REALbasic using v3.

What did you first build with Xojo? And when was that?

My first job was importing foreign code from 4th Dimension into RealBasic. That started back in late 2000.

What do you build with it now?

ERP System AWARD+ including merchandise management, webshop, document database, cash register system, ticketing and much more.

Looking back, how long did it take for your app vision to evolve from a blank project into a working solution?

We moved from 4th Dimension to Xojo and SQL (including own PlugIn for PrimeBase) in about two years for the whole big main ERP module. Other tools took much less time.

What is something you worked on that you want to talk about?

As I mentioned it is of great help to have learned skills outside the world of IT. And don’t invent the wheel twice. Having tools like SIPs or ImageMagick i.e., there is no need to build up your own thumbnail generator.

Do you earn a living with Xojo?

I earned my living for the past 25 years with Xojo. Not every day because I also helped as sysadmin. But my main occupation will soon end.

Do you use it for any hobbies?

Writing small tools for Windows that I am used to having on my Mac and vice versa.

What’s your biggest Xojo success?

Every new app or module finished should be the biggest success. This is what I call motivation. Most proud moment? I remember installing “my” software in a German State Long-Term Archive. Running it started all those tape robots. What a feeling…

If you were introducing Xojo to a friend, which three words would you use to describe it?

• Cross Platform
• Easy to learn and use
• Start for free

Thank you to Carston Kobusch for answering questions and sharing his Xojo experience with the community. 

If you have an app, a project or a person you want to see featured in Spotlight On, tell us about it!

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I wanted something better. Not a generic chatbot that happens to know some Xojo, but a tool that could actually see what I was working on. That’s why I built Zotto (with Xojo!).

What Is Zotto?

Zotto is a cross-platform macOS and Windows app that acts as an AI pair programmer specifically for Xojo developers. It connects directly to the Xojo IDE, reads the project you’re working on, and gives the AI real context about your code such as classes, method signatures, properties. Essentially the whole project’s structure.

The Problem It Solves

The core issue with using general-purpose AI tools for Xojo development is context. When you ask Claude or ChatGPT a question about your project, the AI has no idea what your codebase looks like. You become the middleman, manually feeding it snippets and hoping it has enough information to give useful advice.

Zotto removes some of that friction. When connected to the IDE, the AI can explore your project on its own using built-in tools:

• ProjectOverview gives it the high-level folder structure
• ListItems lets it drill into specific folders
• GetSignatures shows method and property signatures without dumping all the code
• ReadCode pulls up full method implementations when needed
• SearchCode does grep-like pattern searches across the codebase
• SearchDocs lets it search and retrieve Xojo documentation directly

These tools are designed to be token-efficient. Instead of dumping your entire project into the context window, the AI requests only what it needs, when it needs it. A ProjectOverview call might use 300-500 tokens. A GetSignatures call on a class gives the AI the API surface without the implementation details. This layered approach means even large projects work well within context limits.

Read-Only by Design

One decision I made early on was that Zotto would be read-only. It can read your code, analyse it, suggest changes, and generate snippets — but it cannot modify your project files, create new items, or execute IDE scripts.

This is intentional. I think AI-generated code should be reviewed by a developer before it goes into a project. Zotto gives you copy-pasteable suggestions and lets you decide what to implement. You stay in control.

Bring Your Own Model

Zotto isn’t locked to a single AI provider. It supports Claude, OpenAI, Gemini, Ollama, LM Studio, and any OpenAI-compatible API (which covers services like Grok and OpenRouter). If you’re privacy-conscious or working on sensitive code, you can run it entirely offline with a local model through Ollama or LM Studio. Your code never has to leave your machine.

This also means you’re not paying for Zotto’s AI usage — you use your own API keys or local models, so you’re in full control of costs.

How It Works in Practice

A typical workflow looks like this:

1. Open your project in the Xojo IDE
2. Launch Zotto — it detects the IDE automatically
3. Select which open project to work with
4. Start chatting

From there, you might ask the AI to review a class, suggest how to refactor a method, help you understand unfamiliar code in a project you’ve inherited, or brainstorm an approach to a new feature. Because the AI can explore the project itself, the conversation feels much more natural than the copy-paste dance with a generic chatbot.

For example, you could ask: “What does the ProcessOrder method in OrderManager do?” Instead of you having to find and paste the code, Zotto’s AI will call ReadCode to look at the method itself, then maybe GetSignatures on the parent class to understand the broader context, and give you a thorough explanation.

Extending with MCP

For developers who want to go further, Zotto supports the Model Context Protocol (MCP). This lets you add custom tool servers — for file system access, Git operations, database queries, or anything else you might want the AI to have access to during a conversation. It’s the same protocol that Claude Desktop and other AI tools support, so existing MCP servers work out of the box.

Built for the Community

Zotto exists because I needed it for my own Xojo development. I was spending too much time being the translator between AI tools and my codebase. Once I had something working, it seemed like other Xojo developers would find it useful too.

There’s a free version you can try that includes full IDE integration and all the built-in tools with a single conversation. A full license is a one-time purchase of £69 — no subscription. You can learn more and download it at zotto.app.

If you have questions or feedback, I’d love to hear from you on the forum.

Garry Pettet is a Consultant Radiologist, Xojo developer and the creator of Zotto. You can find him on the Xojo forum or at zotto.app.

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In 2025, guest authors shared their expertise and real-world experience on the Xojo Blog. These posts bring fresh perspectives, practical solutions and deep technical insight that help other developers learn faster, solve problems more effectively and feel more connected to the Xojo community.

Guest posts in 2025 included:

• Martin T., Xojo MVP: Hide the Tabs in an Android MobileTabPanel Using Declares
• Martin T., Xojo MVP: Xojo for Android: A Two-Year Retrospective
• Martin T., Xojo MVP: It’s here – Android Design Extensions 4.0
• Anthony Cyphers, GraffitiSuite and Xojo MVP: Handling Feature Requests
• Kem Tekinay, Xojo MVP: MemoryBlocks For Speed: A Case Study
• Kem Tekinay, Xojo MVP: The Beauty of Binary Searches
• Jürg Otter: Build a Xojo Plugin with GitHub Actions
• Ezekiel Burke, Iron Elephant Solutions: Introduction to PocketBase: A Backend Alternative for Xojo Developers

We are always looking for users in the Xojo community who want to share a problem they’ve solved, a creative solution or an interesting project. If you’re interested in contributing a guest post or have an idea you’d like to explore, send it to me at alyssa@xojo.com.

In 2024, we introduced the Spotlight On series to highlight the work Xojo users do and their experiences using Xojo. Since many Xojo users don’t fit the mold of a traditional developer role, Spotlight On offers a fun and approachable way to learn how someone got started with Xojo and how they use it today. Spotlights can focus on an individual developer, a business or a specific Xojo-based project.

Spotlight On features in 2025:

• Spotlight On: GraffitiSuite
• Spotlight On: xDev Magazine
• Spotlight On: LX Aer
• Spotlight On: EKlectic Accounting
• Spotlight On: Raximus Studios
• Spotlight On: Richard Klingler
• Spotlight On: Enrique Contreras
• Spotlight On: Offroad Portal
• Spotlight On: Tim Dietrich
• Spotlight On: Sounds In Sync
• Spotlight On: Android Design Extensions
• Spotlight On: Aaron Andrew Hunt

If you’d like to be featured in a future Spotlight On or know someone in the Xojo community whose story would be great to share, we’d love to hear from you. Reach out with suggestions to me at alyssa@xojo.com.

The Xojo Blog is at its best when it reflects the voices, experiences and creativity of the community itself. Whether through guest posts, Spotlight On posts or shared ideas, we look forward to continuing to learn from and celebrate the people who make Xojo what it is.

Alyssa has been with Xojo for over 18 years. She loves solving problems and building community. You can reach her at alyssa@xojo.com or through any of Xojo’s social media channels. If you can’t reach her she’s probably out hiking the beautiful trails through her city of Portland, Oregon, or maybe enjoying a drink with friends by the river.

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for each item as ArrayType in myArray
  if item.Matches( myValue ) then
    YesSiree( myValue )
    exit
  end if
next

That’s pretty easy, but what if the array is really big? And what if you have to do this many times?

For example, let’s say your array has 10,000 items. For each value that doesn’t match, your code will have to do 10,000 comparisons. But, if your array can be sorted, you can perform that task with, at most, 14 comparisons using a binary search.

The concept is simple: you take an ordered list and start in the middle. If what you’re trying to match is less than that point, you discard the upper half of the list, then start again at the midpoint of the rest. By continuously cutting the list in half, you will do, at most, Ceil(Log2(arrayCount)) comparisons per value.

For simplicity’s sake, let’s say you want to search an array of strings. (Yes, a Dictionary would be the better choice here, but this is just for illustration.) The code would look something like this:

myArray.Sort

var firstIndex as integer = 0
var lastIndex as integer = myArray.LastIndex

while firstIndex <= lastIndex
  var midPoint as integer = ( lastIndex - firstIndex ) \ 2 + firstIndex

  var compare as string = myArray( midPoint )

  if myValue = compare then
    YesSiree( myValue )
    exit
  end if

  if myValue < compare then
    lastIndex = midPoint - 1
  else
    firstIndex = midPoint + 1
  end if
wend

With that 10,000-item array, the first loop would look at item 5,000. If myValue is greater than that, it would next look at item 7,500. Still greater? Now it will look at item 8,750, and so on. The entire array will be processed efficiently with large chunks never needing examination at all. If you have to do this for 1,000 different values, you will end with, at most, 14,000 comparisons instead of 10 million.

Quite the savings, right?

Kem Tekinay is a Mac consultant and programmer who has been using Xojo since its first release to create custom solutions for clients. He is the author of the popular utilities TFTP Client and RegExRX (both written with Xojo) and lives in Connecticut with his wife Lisa, and their cat.

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What this project includes

• A DesktopWindow (wMain) that provides a clean user interface for selecting an image, inputting your message, and generating the final PDF postcard.
• Intelligent image handling that supports common formats like JPG, PNG, and GIF. The application automatically crops your selected image to a perfect 4:6 aspect ratio, ensuring it fits the postcard layout beautifully.
• Robust PDF generation, leveraging Xojo’s PDFDocument and Graphics classes to embed images and render styled text effectively onto the document.
• Customizable message rendering, which includes a subtle drop shadow effect for improved readability and a polished look against your background image.
• Automated saving of the generated PDF postcard to your desktop, complete with a unique, timestamped filename, and immediate opening of the file in your system’s default viewer for quick review.

Download

You can download the entire Xojo project from GitHub.

This project illustrates Xojo’s robust capabilities for handling graphics and generating PDFs, demonstrating how straightforward it is to create functional and creative desktop applications. We encourage you to use this postcard generator as a springboard for your own ideas. Perhaps you could expand it by adding features like custom fonts, multiple message fields, or even integration with a data source for personalized bulk postcards. Or, consider how Xojo’s PDF features could power entirely new applications for reporting, invoicing, or custom document creation. We’d love to see what you build!

Gabriel is a digital marketing enthusiast who loves coding with Xojo to create cool software tools for any platform. He is always eager to learn and share new ideas!

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Year of Code Project

• Year of Code: Kickoff
• January Project: Desktop Apps | Forum Discussion
• February Project: Database Apps | Forum Discussion
• March Project: Web Apps | Forum Discussion
• April Project: User Interface | Forum Discussion
• May Project: Mobile Apps | Forum Discussion
• June Project: Code Sharing | Forum Discussion
• July Project: Charting | Forum Discussion
• August Project: Console Apps | Forum Discussion
• September Project: Games | Forum Discussion
• October Project: Multi-Platform | Forum Discussion
• November Project: PDF | Forum Discussion

How to Play:

Each month we’ll announce a new theme and share an example project of our own. Share your projects to the Xojo Forum thread for that month via GitHub (all the links you need are posted above ↑ ). Learn how to use Xojo and GitHub.

The Prizes:

Monthly winners get $100 at the Xojo store. Every month you submit a project is another chance to win the grand prize. The grand prize is $250 cash plus a Xojo Pro license and a year of GraffitiSuite and will be announce in December. Learn more about the prizes.

What this project includes

• A self-contained UDPSocket subclass (MPACSocket) that handles bind, presence broadcasting, peer pruning, and chat envelopes with versioned JSON (good for further updates to the protocol).
• Simple API: Start(port), Stop(), Rename(name), SendChat(text). Everything else comes through events like Bound, ChatReceived, PeerOnline/PeerOffline, PeerUpdated, StatusChanged, and SocketError.
• A sample DesktopWindow (wndMPAC) that wires MPACSocket to a transcript area and peers list.

How to use

• Add MPACSocket to your project, drop it onto a DesktopWindow or instantiate in code.
• Set DisplayName, call Start(62636), and listen to events to update your UI or console output.
• Use SendChat to broadcast a message; presence beacons and peer tracking happen automatically.

Download

You can download the entire Xojo project from GitHub

This project shows how a small, well-scoped class can turn low-level UDP into a friendly, cross-platform building block. Feel free to adapt the events or JSON schema for your own protocols.

Gabriel is a digital marketing enthusiast who loves coding with Xojo to create cool software tools for any platform. He is always eager to learn and share new ideas!

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Year of Code Project

• Year of Code: Kickoff
• January Project: Desktop Apps | Forum Discussion
• February Project: Database Apps | Forum Discussion
• March Project: Web Apps | Forum Discussion
• April Project: User Interface | Forum Discussion
• May Project: Mobile Apps | Forum Discussion
• June Project: Code Sharing | Forum Discussion
• July Project: Charting | Forum Discussion
• August Project: Console Apps | Forum Discussion
• September Project: Games | Forum Discussion
• October Project: Multi-Platform | Forum Discussion
• November Project: PDF | Forum Discussion

How to Play:

Each month we’ll announce a new theme and share an example project of our own. Share your projects to the Xojo Forum thread for that month via GitHub (all the links you need are posted above ↑ ). Learn how to use Xojo and GitHub.

The Prizes:

Monthly winners get $100 at the Xojo store. Every month you submit a project is another chance to win the grand prize. The grand prize is $250 cash plus a Xojo Pro license and a year of GraffitiSuite and will be announce in December. Learn more about the prizes.

Aaron Andrew Hunt has used Xojo for over 20 years. Recently, he and Geoff Perlman got into a conversation about their shared love of music and coding. Aaron is a composer who uses Xojo (along with MBS plugins) to develop desktop apps for music and publishing. He also creates bespoke music-related apps, in fact, he has been collaborating with a UK-based composer since 2012 on an intensive music database app.

Mac, Windows or Linux?

I’ve been a Mac user since the 90’s, and Xojo lets me write software on the Mac, then port that with minimal effort to Windows. Linux has never held enough incentive for me, but Xojo works on that too. There are obvious differences between the platforms, but Xojo minimises them. Porting code from Mac to Windows sometimes includes a bit of tweaking on Windows, but in many cases it’s a matter of minutes. There have been a few times I’ve developed on Windows and then ported to the Mac. It’s a big plus that Xojo lets us use whichever platform we prefer, and switch platforms easily.

How would you explain your most recent project to a new developer?

My most recent project is protected under a strict NDA, so I’m afraid I’m not allowed to explain it to anyone!

What’s on your “Learn Next” list?

A large part of coding is fairly simple logic, but a project of any complexity is going to present problems that will lead to learning something new, or sometimes re-learning something long forgotten. That learning aspect is one of the most attractive parts of the work for me. I make task lists, but “learn this or that” usually isn’t on the list; I write down the goal, and if I’m able to reach that, it means I’ve learned what I needed to know.

How did you find Xojo? And when did you start using Xojo?

By my count I’ve been using Xojo for 23 years. I had just started a new job teaching at a University, and my mentor, a senior colleague in the department, introduced me to REALBasic. He knew I had been looking for a tool to write music software for the Mac, and RB was relatively new and gaining notoriety. A few years before this I had been using the quirky graphical programming tool called Max (which later became Max/MSP, similar to PureData) on macOS 9. I had learned Max well enough to do some pretty impressive things with it, but I didn’t like because there was no code! Or precious little. Once I started with RB, it took me a while to adjust my antiquated linear thinking to an event-driven object-oriented model, but once enough light-bulbs went off, I was happily coding away (and I never went back to Max).

What did you first build with Xojo? And when was that?

My first projects were ports of the apps I had written in Max, for microtonal music. I also wrote several apps to demonstrate things in the classroom, for example a sprite-based app with a video-game-like feel called The Tonal Solar System, where triads and seventh chords appear as planets orbiting around a tonic sun, and chord progressions happen by “activating” planets in a particular order. It supported inversions and alterations and had some pretty advanced functions. The graphics were nothing spectacular, somewhat similar to the kinds of games I had made as a kid on the Commodore 64. The more serious tools for microtonal music were the beginnings of what later became my business, H-Pi Instruments (https://hpi.zentral.zone) where software works in combination with microtonal hardware I designed with my business partner Jordan Petkov in Bulgaria. There was a microtonal keyboard I designed called the Tonal Plexus, and a micro-tuning device called TBX1, which later became TBX2, and TBX2b. These all worked with apps built using Xojo and the MBS plugins for cross-platform MIDI and audio functions. The Xojo / MBS combination allowed me to develop these apps relatively quickly and easily without getting bogged down with the kinds of management tasks other tools require.

What do you build with it now?

I still maintain and occasionally expand the capabilities of apps that have long histories going back decades. Some more recent projects include PDF Bookmaker a self-publishing tool, MIDI Router a tool for managing and scripting MIDI traffic on desktop macOS, and MIDI Tapper an assisted performance tool for making realistic-sounding recordings by “tapping” through MIDI files using just one or two MIDI keys rather than having to play all the right notes in the conventional sense. These are all apps I developed for my own needs, which I also use on a regular basis. Features are added at customer request, and also whenever I need the app to do something it doesn’t do yet.

MIDI Router is essential for my work – it’s always running in the background, with scripts that solve specific quirky hardware problems in my setup. I use PDF Bookmaker every time I publish a new score, and MIDI Tapper to make quick recordings for myself and for my students. The latter is a really powerful app with a small but enthusiastic user base, which deserves to gain a wider audience (marketing is not really in my skillset). The concept is based on the graphical music animation work of Stephen Malinowski https://www.youtube.com/@smalin.

Do you earn a living with Xojo?

My focus at this point is on writing music and teaching private students, but software sales and hired coding work have definitely been an important part of my livelihood for a long time now, and Xojo is the essential tool for those things. It’s hard to imagine being where I am today without Xojo. I’ve stuck with it because of its consistency and reliability, its friendly management, and the forum, with its very helpful user-base. My licenses will continue to be renewed after retirement. I plan to keep on using it as long as I’m around.

Do you use it for any hobbies?

I use Xojo for all kinds of things for my own private use, not intended for sale (though sometimes such projects do develop into something I eventually offer for sale). Being able to try out ideas and solve practical problems by writing my own apps is a beautiful kind of private joy. An app for exploring Gematria? Prime numbers? Bit-shifted integer encodings? Why not? It’s all fun stuff.

I’ve written many apps to do specific things when I needed some problem solved. Others might search the app store to find a tool they need. Nerds write their own. I wrote my own password manager, for example (why worry about trusting anyone else’s tool with my passwords?) Xojo makes coding easier than any other tool I’ve tried, and for me that’s very important. I don’t want to be fighting with the tool I’m using to try to do something creative. I want to have a pleasant time working as quickly as possible, and that’s basically what I get with Xojo and the MBS plugins.

What’s your biggest Xojo success?

An app called Universal Tuning Editor (UTE) is part of the biggest success I’ve had with my business, because it works in combination with all the hardware devices I’ve developed over the years, the latest being a mini-synthesizer I was able to make with the help of mitxela, called FLASH. This is the world’s smallest polyphonic microtonal MIDI synth, and it communicates with UTE over UART, using the Serial object in Xojo. I can use the UART port to communicate with the bootloader of the chip containing the synth firmware, or I can run that firmware and open the port at MIDI baud rate to control the synth through UTE. This combination lets users program their own patches and upload tuning tables to the synth, which they can then plug into any standard MIDI controller – without a power supply! UTE uses Xojo’s Object2D for scalable, rotatable vector graphics, with XML-based scripting so users can design their own interfaces. Xojo does an amazing job keeping up with the rapid changes in the industry, so I know as long as I do my part, my existing apps will continue to work. If I work on my coding as hard as they do, who knows, some new success could be right around the corner.

Thank you to Aaron Andrew Hunt for answering questions and sharing his Xojo experience with the community. You can see all his programs at https://hpi.zentral.zone.

If you have an app, a project or a person you want to see featured in Spotlight On, tell us about it!

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Create a new Android project with two container controls in the IDE, to which you add some controls. Then switch back to Screen1 in the Navigator and add a MobileSegmentedButton and a MobileTabPanel. In the Inspector, set the locking for the TabPanel to all four sides and assign both container controls to the TabPanel via the Inspector. Those are the basic preparations.

The MobileTabPanel is a subclass of Android’s TabLayout view (com.google.android.material.tabs.TabLayout). This consists of the tabs themselves and a so-called ViewPager that holds the containers.

First, we remove the top tab bar from the control. After that, we update the position of the area where the containers are displayed. Then we disable the swipe gesture (optional). And that’s it.

Now add the Opening event to TabPanel1. First, we add two Android-specific import Declares so that the following Declares don’t take up too much space and readability is maintained:

Declare Sub import1 Lib "android.view.*:Import"
Declare Sub import2 Lib "android.widget.*:Import"

Next, we remove the tab bar from the control:

' Removes the tab bar from the MobileTabPanel.
Declare Function RemoveTabs Lib "Kotlin" Alias "(ref as ViewGroup).apply { visibility = View.GONE }" (ref As Ptr) As Ptr
Call RemoveTabs(Me.Handle)

After that, we adjust the top position of the ViewPager by setting it to 0:

' Update control bounds.
Declare Function GetLayoutParams Lib "Object:Me:MobileTabPanel" Alias "_tabPager!!.layoutParams" As Ptr
Declare Function UpdateLayoutParams Lib "Kotlin" Alias "(ref as FrameLayout.LayoutParams).apply { topMargin = 0 }" (ref As Ptr) As Ptr
Call UpdateLayoutParams(GetLayoutParams)

Now add the Pressed event to the MobileSegmentedButton with this code, which ensures switching between the panels:

TabPanel1.SelectedPanelIndex = segmentedIndex

And that’s it – click Run to start the project.

To make the control feel even more like a PagePanel, we now want to eliminate the ability to switch between panels with swipe gestures. To do this, go back into the TabPanel1 Opening event and add this code:

' Disable swipe.
Declare Sub setUserInputEnabled Lib "Object:Me:MobileTabPanel" Alias "_tabPager!!.setUserInputEnabled" (value As Boolean) setUserInputEnabled(False)

And that’s it: the control is now a PagePanel – without tabs and within the same bounds as the TabPanel.

Here you can see the PagePanel in action.

Once you know where and what to look for in the Android API, there’s almost nothing you can’t already do with Declares in Xojo Android. But if you are looking for a native solution, you can join my feature request to implement MobilePagePanel on Android.

Happy Coding!

Martin T. is a Xojo MVP and has been very involved in testing Android support.

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Martin started using Xojo around the time he got his first MacBook. He was drawn to Xojo’s simplicity and flexibility. If you ask him, Martin will say designing clean, intuitive user interfaces is one of his favorite parts of development. Though he’s also a Xojo MVP, he’s probably best know as the developer behind Android Design Extensions.

Mac, Windows or Linux?

Mac.

How would you explain your most recent project to a new developer?

The Android Design Extensions are a collection of enhancements for Android projects in Xojo, aimed at polishing the UI of your apps. This is the primary focus of the project. It addresses aspects that Xojo does not natively provide.

We live in a visual world—design in advertising and product presentation shapes users’ impressions of a company or product. The same applies to software. Is the UI user-friendly and visually appealing? Is it enjoyable to use the app? These questions have always been the guiding principles behind the creation of the Android Design Extensions.

What do you think Martin from 2020 would think about what you do now?

Five years ago, I could never have imagined that I would be a Xojo MVP and be able to make my own project available to other users. Android Design Extensions is the result of many hundreds of hours of intensive collaboration with the Xojo team, which has resulted in Xojo Android becoming more stable and, above all, enormously powerful. For example, in terms of declares, it’s really easy and there’s hardly anything now that you can’t implement in Android projects, as long as you know how to read the Android API and handle declares.

That’s almost the best memory of the last five years, that Xojo has listened to feedback from Android users and responded very quickly. It’s amazing how fast Android support in Xojo has progressed over the past two years.

What is on your “Learn Next” list?

Definitely delve deeper into Android APIs to explore the possibilities of Xojo Android even more.

How did you find Xojo? And when did you start using Xojo?

I first came into contact with Xojo around 2008. At that time it was still called Real Studio and I had found it on a DVD that was enclosed with a computer magazine. I was an active Delphi developer at the time and immediately fell in love with the simplicity of the language.

What do you build with Xojo now?

Fortunately, I have greatly expanded my programming skills thanks to Xojo. My focus is on UI development, controls, especially the TextInputCanvas, Android and desktop programs.

What is something you worked on that you want to talk about?

I became very friendly with TextInputCanvas (a free plugin) and together with Björn Eiríksson from Einhugur, we created an updated API 2.0 version of the plugin, which we still maintain today.

I used to work as a developer for Bob Keeney and was responsible for the Formatted Text Control, which is based on TextInputCanvas. There are several programs on the market that make intensive use of this control and I am still involved in some of these projects today, making the WYSIWYG experience even more pleasant for customers when entering text.

Do you use Xojo for any hobbies?

I also use Xojo to write software for genealogical purposes. From a young age, I developed a curiosity and desire to learn more about the history of my family and its members. That is how I came to genealogy. It is a kind of detective work that can lead to surprising family connections, secrets, strokes of fate, and even unknown relatives. Since I enjoy reading, I prefer to have such information in book form and written out, rather than in tables. A book with text feels more tangible to me—something the reader can engage with more consciously.

None of the genealogy software available on the market has ever met my expectations. That is why I wrote my own software in Xojo, which can process the standard format for genealogical data known as Gedcom. You can think of it as a database in plain text format. From this data, I can then generate—depending on what is desired—full biographies, ancestor and descendant trees, and more. The finished result is a Word document, complete with indices at the end for all people, places, professions, and so on—just like in a real book.

Thank you to Martin T. for answering questions and sharing his Xojo experience with the community. Martin accepts donations for his work on Android Design Extensions. Download Android Design Extensions. Read more about Android Design Extensions on the Xojo Blog.

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Most of the development effort over the past two years was certainly spent fixing compiler errors. In 2023 and 2024, the framework was still encountering errors during app builds. Since then, the situation has improved significantly—thanks in large part to hundreds of issues submitted by users. Example projects were particularly helpful for the Xojo team in identifying and fixing bugs. It’s always important to show Xojo how we as users work with the IDE and write our code, as our approaches often differ and expose edge cases that Xojo doesn’t cover out of the box. The past two years have therefore also helped Xojo better understand how developers actually use the product.

The initial Android beta in 2023 included a basic set of UI controls. Over time, four more were added: MobilePopupMenu, AndroidMobileUserControl, MobileMapViewer, as well as classes like Barcode, TCPSocket, and UserAuthentication. This brings the Android target closer to the iOS feature set, with the long-term goal of enabling unified mobile projects that can build for both platforms. However, some steps are still needed to reach that point. The Android framework itself has seen substantial improvements over the past two years. Several new classes were added to enhance the developer and user experience compared to other platforms: RegEx, Set, ColorGroup, structures, localization, dark mode support, and more.

I asked Paul Levebvre, the lead developer of the Android framework, what the most challenging moments over the last two years were for him: “It may have been only two years, but I feel like I’ve aged 10! I am pleased with the forward progress and it’s always great to see the amazing things that people have created with Xojo for Android. The hardest thing to get working—by a wide margin—was the debugger. Nothing else comes close. In the past two years, the most difficult things have probably been TCPSocket, Operator_Convert, ColorGroup, MapViewer, and ByRef. Right now, the plan is to continue fixing bugs and adding features to get Android to feature parity with iOS.”

The development of the Android Design Extensions began early in the public alpha phase of Xojo Android. This close integration led to numerous improvements and enhancements in the Android Declare engine. Today, there’s practically nothing you can’t implement on Android using Declares, even native controls—provided there’s no built-in Xojo support yet. Naturally, this does require some knowledge of the Android API and the Kotlin programming language. With the help of the Android Design Extensions, you can further enhance your apps, much like you might already do in your iOS projects using Jérémie Leroy’s iOS Design Extensions.

Of course, there’s still a lot of work to be done to bring Android up to the same level as iOS. For example, support for custom attributes and AttributeInfo is still missing, along with several control-specific features, the DatabaseConnection class, XML handling, PDFDocument, and more. It’s important that we test thoroughly and cover as many edge cases as possible to make Android support truly stable—and to ensure that the full Xojo language feature set works as expected. As a welcome side effect, the Xojo documentation has also improved significantly through this extensive testing. Encouraging, indeed.

Martin T. is a Xojo MVP and has been very involved in testing Android support.

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What this project includes:

• Interactive command-line interface to manage tasks
• Commands to add new tasks, mark tasks complete, list all tasks, and remove tasks
• Simple file saving/loading to keep your tasks persistent between sessions
• Clean and modular code architecture for easy customization or extension

This project highlights how Xojo can be used beyond GUI applications, making it ideal for automation scripts, tooling, or quick utilities you want to run directly in the console (Mac, any Linux flavor, Windows) without the overhead of a full UI.

You can check out the full source code and try it out yourself at GitHub: Xojo-Console-Tasks.

Give it a spin, modify it to suit your needs, and share your enhancements or questions with the Xojo community. This is a great way to get comfortable with console application design in Xojo and to stretch your coding skills in a new context.

Stay tuned for next month’s project as we continue our journey deep into the many facets of coding with Xojo!

Year of Code Project

• Year of Code: Kickoff
• January Project: Desktop Apps | Forum Discussion
• February Project: Database Apps | Forum Discussion
• March Project: Web Apps | Forum Discussion
• April Project: User Interface | Forum Discussion
• May Project: Mobile Apps | Forum Discussion
• June Project: Code Sharing | Forum Discussion
• July Project: Charting | Forum Discussion
• August Project: Console Apps | Forum Discussion
• September Project: Games | Forum Discussion
• October Project: Multi-Platform | Forum Discussion
• November Project: PDF | Forum Discussion

How to Play:

Each month we’ll announce a new theme and share an example project of our own. Share your projects to the Xojo Forum thread for that month via GitHub (all the links you need are posted above ↑ ). Learn how to use Xojo and GitHub.

The Prizes:

Monthly winners get $100 at the Xojo store. Every month you submit a project is another chance to win the grand prize. The grand prize is $250 cash plus a Xojo Pro license and a year of GraffitiSuite and will be announce in December. Learn more about the prizes.

Gabriel is a digital marketing enthusiast who loves coding with Xojo to create cool software tools for any platform. He is always eager to learn and share new ideas!

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While license pricing is going up, we’re also increasing long-term value for our loyal users by doubling the auto-renewal discount from 10% to 20%.

What’s Changing Today

Beginning today, new Xojo Desktop, Web and Mobile licenses are $499/year. New Xojo Pro is $999/year. Xojo Pro Plus will remain $1999/year.

The Xojo Lite license is being retired and is no longer available. Existing Lite licenses will continue to function as expected. Lite renewals will be available until August 4, 2025. In order to receive future updates, existing Lite license holders will need to upgrade when their current license expires.

What is Coming Up

While the new pricing is in effect for new licenses starting today, we want to give existing users time to renew under the current pricing. The updated pricing for renewals and upgrades will take effect on August 4, 2025. One and two year renewals are available on our website. New and expired licenses can be renewed anytime. If you are interested in renewing for a longer period, please contact our support team.

The standard auto-renewal discount is doubling from 10% to 20%. Additionally, users who maintain an unexpired license¹ will receive even greater discounts over time: 25% after five consecutive years and 30% after ten years.²

We do not make this decision lightly. Our goal is to ensure that we can continue to invest in Xojo. This update reflects not only inflation over recent years but also the expanded value we’ve added to Xojo.

We remain committed to providing excellent value and keeping Xojo more affordable than many alternatives in the market. Raising prices today helps us keep that promise long-term.

Note: These changes do not affect the Xojo IDE which remains free for downloading, development and testing. You can still install Xojo on as many machines as you like and run your projects using the free IDE. Building for Linux and Raspberry Pi also remain free and do not require a license.

1. Updated to include all renewal types: Maintain an unexpired license, using auto-renewal or manual renewal, to receive these discounts. Renewals placed before a license expires always include the full 12 months of support. ︎
2. Discounts are automatically applied based on your auto-renewal history beginning August 4, 2025 and are not retroactive. ︎

For this project, I created a small iPhone app to track my expenses – something I personally needed. While it’s designed for tracking holiday and travel spending, it works just as well for managing general monthly expenses.

Far from perfect, but useful for the described scenarios, this iPhone app lets the user set a trip location, add a description and even define a budget. That way, they can check in at any time to see how things are going during a trip or when tracking general monthly expenses. (It doesn’t make much sense to offer this kind of app for iPad.)

When it comes to entering new expenses, I wanted to keep it as simple as possible with minimal input and just a few taps. So, aside from entering the amount and the place where the expense occurred, the app automatically captures the geolocation. This helps me better remember places like restaurants, gas stations or points of interest I might want to stop at or visit again when traveling the same route.

When tracking monthly expenses, the app lets you duplicate existing entries so details like the expense location remain the same, and you only need to enter the new amount. This is especially handy if you tend to refuel at the same gas station or do your weekly grocery shopping at the same store.

So, what about charts? Honestly, this area has plenty of room for improvement and could eventually include a wide range of stats and visualizations. But for this initial release, I kept it simple to meet my own needs. In addition to the basic ‘Total Budget vs. Current Expenses’ stats, the app includes a Pie chart that breaks down spending by category.

Of course, you can download the full source code here and adapt or improve it so it suits your own needs.

Want to give it a try? The iOS app is available for free on the App Store: https://apple.co/3EGL33r

VoyageExpenses is built entirely with Xojo. It’s 100% Xojo code, with only two small exceptions where Declares were needed. It was published to the App Store using the Publish feature introduced in Xojo 2025r1.

Visit the Xojo Docs to learn more about using charts in Xojo. Visual elements like charts can make the data in your apps more memorable and impactful. We’ve written extensively on charting throughout the Xojo Blog.

Year of Code Project

• Year of Code: Kickoff
• January Project: Desktop Apps | Forum Discussion
• February Project: Database Apps | Forum Discussion
• March Project: Web Apps | Forum Discussion
• April Project: User Interface | Forum Discussion
• May Project: Mobile Apps | Forum Discussion
• June Project: Code Sharing | Forum Discussion
• July Project: Charting | Forum Discussion
• August Project: Console Apps | Forum Discussion
• September Project: Games | Forum Discussion
• October Project: Multi-Platform | Forum Discussion
• November Project: PDF | Forum Discussion

How to Play:

Each month we’ll announce a new theme and share an example project of our own. Share your projects to the Xojo Forum thread for that month via GitHub (all the links you need are posted above ↑ ). Learn how to use Xojo and GitHub.

The Prizes:

Monthly winners get $100 at the Xojo store. Every month you submit a project is another chance to win the grand prize. The grand prize is $250 cash plus a Xojo Pro license and a year of GraffitiSuite and will be announce in December. Learn more about the prizes.

Javier Menendez is an engineer at Xojo and has been using Xojo since 1998. He lives in Castellón, Spain and hosts regular Xojo hangouts en español. Ask Javier questions on Twitter at @XojoES or on the Xojo Forum.

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With the introduction of the new MobileMapViewer for Android, users now have the ability to customize the behavior and appearance of MobileMapViewer instances. For example, they can hide the zoom controls by using SetZoomControlsEnabledXC(False), or enable/disable certain gestures (zoom, rotation, etc.). You can also set the minimum and maximum zoom level for the control by using the SetMaxZoomPreferenceXC or SetMinZoomPreferenceXC methods.

Android 15 users now also gain access to 16 additional system colors.

Give it a try! More exciting Android features are coming soon. Stay tuned!

Feel free to take a look at the developer repository, create feature requests, and provide feedback on extending this extension library.

I’m happy to receive any voluntary financial support for the work I’ve done so far, which you are welcome to share here. You can download the project with many examples at https://github.com/XojoGermany/AndroidDesignExtensions.

Happy coding.

Martin T. is a Xojo MVP and has been very involved in testing Android support.

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We first met Mark Franken in 2016 at a Xojo Developer Conference in Houston, Texas. Today, Mark splits his time between writing software and caring for 40 acres of rainforest. But before he traded city life for the wild, he spent decades in film and television post-production. In 2003, while still working in post, he founded Sounds In Sync, a company born out of his desire to solve the problems he faced in the editing room. What started as a side project quickly grew in popularity, and eventually, Mark shifted his focus full-time to software development. As a sound editor, Mark worked on some iconic and award-winning films including The Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, Mad Max: Fury Road, The Great Gatsby, Happy Feet Two, and Peter Rabbit.

Mac, Windows or Linux?

Develop on Mac, build for Mac & Windows

How would you explain your most recent project to a new developer?

I’ve been working on a major update for my app EdiCue, scheduled for release as EdiCue v5 in June 2025.

EdiCue is a tool used by sound editors to “cue” dialogue that needs to be re-recorded in film and TV projects. Typically, this involves working alongside the sound editing application Pro Tools to place clips on the timeline, each clip aligned with a section of dialogue and named with the exact text the actor needs to re-perform (e.g., due to background noise, unclear delivery, or script changes).

For this release, I wanted to streamline the manual cueing process by integrating AI-based speech-to-text. Specifically, I’ve added a new feature that allows users to load a WAV file, transcribe the dialogue using Whisper AI, and then export a Pro Tools session with timeline clips automatically named using the transcribed text and timing.

The integration required wrapping whisper.cpp for use in my Xojo-based application. I worked with Christian from Monkeybread Software (MBS) to build a custom plugin that bridges between Xojo and the compiled Whisper Dylib/DLL files, enabling support for macOS and Windows.

What is something that has surprised you about coding in the last 5 years?

The biggest surprise for me has been how far AI has come in understanding, writing, and explaining code. While it still makes mistakes and doesn’t always produce perfect output, for me it’s now an invaluable tool, working in languages I hadn’t formally learned like Python and C/C++.

Thanks to AI, I’ve been able to build and compile C/C++ libraries and create my own shared libraries (Dylibs/DLLs). This has let me expose C++ functionality through clean C-style APIs, making them accessible from within my Xojo applications. It’s dramatically expanded what my apps are capable of.

In the past, I’d reach out to Christian at Monkeybread Software to write me a  plugin or port specific code to Xojo, something I’ve always appreciated. But for my latest project, I needed to navigate this myself as I wasn’t exactly sure what was required from the start.

With AI’s help, I’ve successfully compiled third-party libraries that use gRPC for both macOS and Windows, built a shared library layer, and exposed the functions I needed to call from Xojo.

I learnt a lot in the process, and now I’m confident in rebuilding and maintaining these libraries as updates are released.

Xojo isn’t the only tool in your kit. What is a piece of software more people should know about?

One tool I highly recommend is Hex Fiend – a hex editor for macOS. I found it especially invaluable while updating my Xojo WAV file classes, where I needed to ensure that I was reading and writing metadata correctly.

Hex Fiend’s main window displays the raw hex data of the file, while a side panel interprets the data for various file formats, including support for WAV files. It decodes the fields, letting you see exactly how your code is affecting the underlying binary layout.

This allowed me to track down a number of bugs in my metadata handling code which would have been hard to track down otherwise.

How did you find Xojo? And when did you start using Xojo?

I first discovered Xojo back in 2002, when it was still known as RealBasic. At the time, I was working as a sound editor on The Lord of the Rings – The Two Towers in New Zealand. A fellow editor visiting from San Francisco introduced me to it, and I was immediately impressed.

I had been using Delphi/Kylix up to that point, but I was looking for a way to build cross-platform desktop apps for Mac and Windows. RealBasic’s ability to generate native applications for both platforms from a single codebase had me sold, and it fit perfectly with the kind of tools I wanted to create for audio post-production workflows.

What did you first build with Xojo? And when was that?

In December 2003, I built my first Xojo app ‘EdiTrace Auto’ for both Mac (OS9) and Windows. It was designed to load EDL (Edit Decision List) files generated by my online comparison tool at EdiTrace.com.

The app would parse the EDL events and convert them into keystroke commands that it could send to Pro Tools, automating the process of recutting sound edits to match the latest picture version delivered by the video editors. This saved sound editors a huge amount of time by eliminating the need to manually conform their sessions to match the new picture cut.

What do you build with it now?

My original app ‘EdiTrace Auto’ eventually evolved into a more powerful tool: EdiLoad. In January 2025, I released EdiLoad v6, which includes a major new feature: the ability to compare the waveforms of “assembled” WAV files against a guide track provided by the picture department.

This lets sound editors verify that WAV files recorded on set are assembling perfectly in-phase, down to the sample, with the guide audio, ensuring audio alignment is sample-accurate.

To implement this, I explored how Fast Fourier Transform (FFT) can be used to analyze the frequency content of complex waveforms. A helpful introduction for me was this YouTube video, which explained the core concepts.

After a fair amount of experimentation, I landed on a solution using an FFT function from an MBS plugin. I transform the two waveforms, sum them, and invert the result to obtain the sample-level offset.

In EdiLoad this processing is handled by a Xojo Worker, which was the first time I had used one. It was a great fit, as each alignment task just required two file paths, a time range, and a handful of user settings. The workers allow the app to access multiple cores while batch-processing all files in the assembly. You can see the feature in action in this EdiLoad v6 demo video.

What is something you worked on that you want to talk about?

One project I’m particularly proud of is writing a set of Xojo classes to read and write Pro Tools session (.ptx) files, despite having no formal software development training.

Pro Tools sessions store their data in a proprietary binary format, and there’s no public specification available. But to deliver key features my clients needed, I had to find a way to read and write these files directly from my Xojo apps.

To reverse-engineer the format, I built several test apps to see how the data was structured, and then modify known parts of the PTX files and compared results. By selectively changing binary data, I was able to track down how specific values were stored. It was a painstaking, months-long process, but it ultimately gave me the tools to read and write session data reliably.

These classes are now in used in three of my desktop apps. I also created a REST API that several online services use to convert marker data into PTX session files, allowing users to generate markers that can be imported directly into Pro Tools.

Do you earn a living with Xojo?

Yes. Xojo, and the supportive Xojo community gave me the opportunity to learn software development in my spare time while I was still working full-time as a sound editor. Over time, I was able to release my own apps through my website, gradually building up a sustainable software business.

After 20 years in post-production, I was able to transition full-time into software development. That shift also gave my family and me the freedom to leave the city (Sydney, Australia) and move to a quieter life in the bush, about six hours up the coast.

Now I work from home, doing what I love, and I’m incredibly grateful for the flexibility it gives me to be present while our kids grow up. It’s not just a career change, it’s been a lifestyle upgrade.

Do you use it for any hobbies?

Not really. When I’m not working, I try to step away from the screen. I spend my downtime in the garden, the bush, or looking after my bees. But I find quite often that I get my best code insights and ideas while I’m in nature.

What’s your biggest Xojo success?

Without a doubt, it’s been getting my applications established across the global film and TV industry, and using my background in sound editing to develop cutting-edge tools that directly support my peers.

The highlight has been receiving not one, but two Engineering Emmy Awards, one for EdiCue and another for EdiLoad. These awards recognized the impact of my apps in setting new standards for technological excellence in television post-production.

Thank you to Mark Franken for answering questions and sharing his Xojo experience with the community. Learn more about Sounds In Sync.

If you have an app, a project or a person you want to see featured in Spotlight On, tell us about it!

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Introducing dataClass: Universal Data Fetching for Xojo

Do you ever wish you could just grab some remote JSON data, search through it, and use it in your app, no matter what kind of project you’re building? That’s exactly what this little, pure-Xojo dataClass allows!

Here’s what it does:

• Loads a list of posts from a web API (using standard URLConnection and Xojo’s built-in JSONItem).
• Lets you search by any term within the post’s title or body – case-insensitive.
• Works unchanged in all Xojo project types – all of them!

Why is This Cool?

By using only built-in classes and avoiding platform-specific quirks, you can build business logic and utility classes that drop straight into your app, whatever the deployment target.

The Complete Source Code

You can copy the full dataClass source from this GitHub repository.

What Will You Build?

Have a favorite cross-platform Xojo technique, class or code module? Show us your own! Share in this month’s Year of Code forum thread.

Stay tuned for more Year of Code 2025 examples, and happy coding!

Gabriel is a digital marketing enthusiast who loves coding with Xojo to create cool software tools for any platform. He is always eager to learn and share new ideas!

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Year of Code Project

• Year of Code: Kickoff
• January Project: Desktop Apps | Forum Discussion
• February Project: Database Apps | Forum Discussion
• March Project: Web Apps | Forum Discussion
• April Project: User Interface | Forum Discussion
• May Project: Mobile Apps | Forum Discussion
• June Project: Code Sharing | Forum Discussion
• July Project: Charting | Forum Discussion
• August Project: Console Apps | Forum Discussion
• September Project: Games | Forum Discussion
• October Project: Multi-Platform | Forum Discussion
• November Project: PDF | Forum Discussion

How to Play:

Each month we’ll announce a new theme and share an example project of our own. Share your projects to the Xojo Forum thread for that month via GitHub (all the links you need are posted above ↑ ). Learn how to use Xojo and GitHub.

The Prizes:

Monthly winners get $100 at the Xojo store. Every month you submit a project is another chance to win the grand prize. The grand prize is $250 cash plus a Xojo Pro license and a year of GraffitiSuite and will be announce in December. Learn more about the prizes.

But even though I have my own pets, I do love looking at pet pictures. It’s a simple pleasure, but there’s not much that I find more calming.

Years ago I made a Xojo app (CatsUp) that displayed random cat pictures and it was a lot of fun. And one thing that Xojo excels at is making it fun to create software! That’s what the Year of Code is all about, after all.

Speaking of that, here is the Year of Code topic for May: Mobile Apps.

You can already find CatsUp for iOS and Android included in the Xojo examples, but why stop at just cats? Being a dog guy, I want to see some dogs. All the dogs.

Since I’m not here to start a cats vs. dogs war, I thought, why not both? It turns out I’m not the only one that thinks this as there are actually public web services that serve up pictures of cats and dogs. Web services and mobile apps go together like peanuts butter and chocolate.

The web service for cats that I’ve previously used is called TheCatAPI and is available here: https://thecatapi.com

There is an equivalent dog one called, unsurprisingly, TheDogAPI: https://www.thedogapi.com

For my mobile app this month, I’ve created an all-new app that can show pictures of cats, dogs or both! I call it Pawz.

Actually, it’s two apps since I made versions for iOS and Android. Here’s a look:

Although they are separate projects, both use basically the same code. In fact there is only about 50 lines of code in each project! The UI itself is just a big ImageViewer that is used to show the picture and several toolbar buttons.

There are three buttons to request a cat picture, dog picture or a surprise picture that could be either. There is also an extra button that lets you share the picture, if you really like it.

You can find the source for the iOS and Android versions of Pawz on GitHub here:

https://github.com/paullefebvre/pawz

Year of Code is all about having some fun making an app. As you can see with Pawz, it doesn’t have to be anything extravagant. Even fun apps can be made quickly with very little code!

I can’t wait to see what great mobile apps you all create this month. Share your creations in the Forum topic.

One More Thing

Although phones and tablets are what we usually think of when talking about Mobile Apps, you know what else is rather mobile? A vehicle! And it just so happens that many vehicle manufacturers, such as Cadillac, Chevy, Ford, Honda, Polestar, Renault and Volvo are now using Android to run their infotainment systems. Technically it’s Android Automotive OS (AAOS), but it is very similar to regular Android.

Because Xojo builds standard Android Runtime (ART) apps, Xojo Android apps also work on Android Automotive OS as a “parked app”. You can test with this by using Android Studio to install an Android Automotive VM for the Emulator. Once you’ve added that you can run your Xojo Android projects on it just like any other device. Pawz works fine in an AAOS Emulator.

Why do I bring this up? No reason, although I believe Xojo 2025 Release 2 pre-release testing might be starting soon…

Paul learned to program in BASIC at age 13 and has programmed in more languages than he remembers, with Xojo being an obvious favorite. When not working on Xojo, you can find him talking about retrocomputing at Goto 10 and on Mastodon @lefebvre@hachyderm.io.

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Year of Code Project

• Year of Code: Kickoff
• January Project: Desktop Apps | Forum Discussion
• February Project: Database Apps | Forum Discussion
• March Project: Web Apps | Forum Discussion
• April Project: User Interface | Forum Discussion
• May Project: Mobile Apps | Forum Discussion
• June Project: Code Sharing | Forum Discussion
• July Project: Charting | Forum Discussion
• August Project: Console Apps | Forum Discussion
• September Project: Games | Forum Discussion
• October Project: Multi-Platform | Forum Discussion
• November Project: PDF | Forum Discussion

How to Play:

Each month we’ll announce a new theme and share an example project of our own. Share your projects to the Xojo Forum thread for that month via GitHub (all the links you need are posted above ↑ ). Learn how to use Xojo and GitHub.

The Prizes:

Monthly winners get $100 at the Xojo store. Every month you submit a project is another chance to win the grand prize. The grand prize is $250 cash plus a Xojo Pro license and a year of GraffitiSuite and will be announce in December. Learn more about the prizes.

The goal wasn’t to add new features but to explore how applying thoughtful UI design principles can significantly enhance the look and feel of an application, making it more visually appealing and cohesive.

Here are some of the key aspects of the UI revamp:

• Design System Foundation: I started by establishing a basic design system. This involved defining core visual elements to ensure consistency across the entire application interface.
• Typography Definition: Specific styles were defined for how titles and standard text should appear. This helps create a clear visual hierarchy and improves readability.
• Consistent Color Palette: A specific set of colors (Light & Dark mode) was chosen and implemented throughout the project, contributing to a unified and more polished look.
• Refined ListBox Appearance: The standard DesktopListBox control received some visual tweaks to better align with the overall updated aesthetic.

The aim was to demonstrate how focusing on UI details can elevate even a simple example application.

Here’s a glimpse of the revamped ToDo app:

You can find the complete source code for this UI-enhanced ToDo app project on GitHub.

Stay tuned for more exciting projects as we continue our Year of Code 2025 journey!

Gabriel is a digital marketing enthusiast who loves coding with Xojo to create cool software tools for any platform. He is always eager to learn and share new ideas!

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Year of Code Project

• Year of Code: Kickoff
• January Project: Desktop Apps | Forum Discussion
• February Project: Database Apps | Forum Discussion
• March Project: Web Apps | Forum Discussion
• April Project: User Interface | Forum Discussion
• May Project: Mobile Apps | Forum Discussion
• June Project: Code Sharing | Forum Discussion
• July Project: Charting | Forum Discussion
• August Project: Console Apps | Forum Discussion
• September Project: Games | Forum Discussion
• October Project: Multi-Platform | Forum Discussion
• November Project: PDF | Forum Discussion

How to Play:

Each month we’ll announce a new theme and share an example project of our own. Share your projects to the Xojo Forum thread for that month via GitHub (all the links you need are posted above ↑ ). Learn how to use Xojo and GitHub.

The Prizes:

Monthly winners get $100 at the Xojo store. Every month you submit a project is another chance to win the grand prize. The grand prize is $250 cash plus a Xojo Pro license and a year of GraffitiSuite and will be announce in December. Learn more about the prizes.

Understand the Need

The first step when I tackle a feature request is to thoroughly understand what the request is really about. People rarely have the ability to articulate exactly what they need, but are great at giving you just enough details — in small bursts — to figure it out if you carefully investigate their use case.

If you’re unsure of what they’re really trying to accomplish, ask for clarification. It’s better to spend more time up-front finding out what you really need to do than it is to rewrite your changes later. If you find yourself frequently modifying new code based on additional requests shortly after writing it then you may need to work on your communication.

Slow down, ask questions, try to get it right the first time. It’s not always as simple as a specification document (assuming you have one).

Understand the Code

Now that you understand the request, it’s time to analyze the code. Let’s be real, very few people can keep their entire codebase in their mind. Read through your code. Like a book. Follow function calls, property setters, everything. Make sure you understand what you’re modifying before you proceed, and look for the areas you’ll need to modify.

Sometimes this is much easier than others depending on the complexity of the project. And take notes! This step is especially important if you’re working on Other People’s Code (OPC).

Understand the Path

Next, develop a plan. Since you’ve read through code and, presumably, developed some ideas on the best way to implement, develop your own specification for the change. Give yourself time to fully work out the new implementation — I use private notes in my support system for wrapping my head around everything, which has the benefit of giving me greater insight if I need to come back later for some reason.

Work out the path forward before you ever modify any code by noting where you’ll make changes and what those changes might entail, keeping in mind that your previous functionality should continue to work as expected. This might involve creating new code paths specifically for the new feature to ensure that you don’t break old, working code. It’s also important to note things outside the scope of the new feature that you’ll need to test afterward to be sure that you didn’t break anything.

Build the Road

After you have a plan, it’s time to start building. If your strategy has been adequately outlined and you enjoy writing code, this is probably the most fun part. Follow your plan and make changes as you’ve outlined them. Be on the lookout for edge cases or caveats that you may have missed in your specification notes, chances are that they do exist.

Test Everything

Finally, testing! Don’t just test the new feature, test the old functionality as well. It’s common that feature requests require modifying existing systems and you don’t want to push out that new release with a cool new feature only to have existing functionality break. Your work will look rushed and careless, and that’s worse than it taking a bit longer to complete.

Bonus Tip

Know when to rewrite. Over time codebases can become monolithic and overly complex based on continually adding features that were never considered when the project or features being modified were first created. If you find yourself spending more and more time trying to understand your code paths or fixing old functionality that new features break, it may be time to develop a new project specification and start from scratch. Don’t be afraid of tossing out something that causes you endless headaches to modify.

Conclusion

Whether working in a team or solo, a slow and methodical approach to feature requests will ensure that your changes last and customers are happy. Don’t rely on code reviews to catch issues or multiple requests after the fact to get everything right. You’ll make mistakes and miss things, but your work will be much better received with a little additional care.