.NET Native Setup and Configuration
You can develop Windows Store apps that compile to native code on x64 and ARM devices by using .NET Native with Visual Studio 2015 Preview and Windows 8.1. Follow the steps in the following sections.
Getting your machine ready
To prepare your development environment to create Windows Store apps using .NET Native:
On your development machine:
- Install Visual Studio 2015 Preview and Windows 8.1 or Windows 10 for x64 or x86. The .NET Native tool chain is automatically installed along with Visual Studio.
On your ARM device, if your app targets ARM:
Install Windows 8.1.
Install the ARM remote debugging tools for Visual Studio. For setup information, see Set Up the Remote Tools on the Device. To configure the remote debugger, see these articles in the Windows Dev Center:
If you are developing on Windows 8.1, install the optional but recommended Update for Microsoft .NET Native for Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2. The update improves .NET Native performance and error reporting. For more information, see Description of the update for .NET Native in Windows 8.1, Windows RT 8.1, and Windows Server 2012 R2.
Note
If you're developing on an x86 system and targeting an x64 system, you should follow the same steps to configure your x64 system for remote debugging as you do for an ARM system.
You can then begin to develop apps that use the .NET Native tool chain to create binaries that target ARM devices. For step-by-step information, see Getting Started with .NET Native.
Restoring defaults
To opt out of using the .NET Native tool chain:
On the Application tab of the project's Properties dialog box, clear the Enable static analysis for .NET Native check box.
On the Build tab of the project’s Properties dialog box, clear the Compile with .NET Native tool chain check box for each configuration and platform combination.
In Configuration Manager, which is available from the solution’s Properties dialog box, reset Active solution platform to AnyCPU.
Optionally, to completely remove all artifacts, you can edit your .csproj project file and remove any XML elements named EnableDotNetNativeCompatibleProfile and UseDotNetNativeToolchain. In earlier releases of .NET Native, these XML elements were named EnableProjectNCompatibleProfile and UseProjectNToolchain; you should remove them as well if they exist in your .csproj project file.