The Microsoft team recently announced that the Windows Community Toolkit Labs is now the primary means by which the company will develop new features for Windows Community Toolkit. It is intended to serve as a safe space for collaboration and engineering solutions from the prototyping phase to the finished and finalized component.
According to Microsoft, Windows Community Toolkit Labs will make it easier for users to contribute to the toolkit, try out new features still in development, and cooperate on the development process together.
The new “Labs” repository will host new item and development discussions as well as initial “experiments” that will each represent a new component (or set of related components) that will begin its journey from an initial implementation to a well-tested functionality working through a defined set of criteria and quality barriers along the way.
With Windows Community Toolkit Labs, users can make changes in Labs, try out new ideas, and not have to worry about code having to be “shippable” to make it to the repository.
This makes it easier for the company to gather developer feedback, collaborate with users on component, testing, and documentation, and reduce monolithic PR review overhead.
Quality gates can then be abstracted as part of this process and gradually review and move components from the prototyping stage to a production quality component.
Several experiments have already been set up, including CanvasLayout, a prototype virtualized canvas view on top of ItemsRepeater; CanvasView, a panel-based ItemControl using a canvas that supports basic manipulation out of the box; SettingsCard, a component to provide a consistent settings experience for your application; and more.
To get involved and help with Labs, click here for the list of issues and join the discussions. After the Toolkit version 7.1.3 is released, the Microsoft team will begin to open Labs up to new experiences and focus on moving new development there. To learn more, visit the website.
