🎯 Avalonia Templates for VS Code

Generate fully-structured Avalonia UI components with one click. No more boilerplate. Just clean, scalable code.

A powerful VS Code extension that automates the creation of Avalonia UI components — including Window, UserControl, TemplatedControl, Styles, and ResourceDictionary — with proper namespace handling, directory structure, automatic using statements, and real-time logging.

Perfect for developers building cross-platform desktop apps with Avalonia UI in C# and XAML.

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🚀 Features

✨ Core Template Generation

Feature	Description
Window	Creates a complete Window.axaml + WindowViewModel.cs with proper inheritance from ViewModelBase.
UserControl	Generates UserControl.axaml + matching ViewModel with correct namespace & folder structure.
TemplatedControl	Boilerplate-ready templated control with TemplatePart attributes and default style.
Styles	Auto-generates Styles.axaml with theme-aware resource definitions.
ResourceDictionary	Clean, isolated ResourceDictionary.axaml files with optional namespace setup.

🔧 Advanced Automation

• Smart Namespace Detection: Automatically detects project root and applies correct namespaces based on folder hierarchy.
• Automatic using Statements: Adds only the necessary using directives for Avalonia and your project’s ViewModel base class — no clutter.
• Folder Structure Preservation: Creates ViewModels in /ViewModels/ subfolder, matching your project’s layout.
• Configurable Logging: Control verbosity with avaloniaTemplates.logLevel (debug, info, warn, error, none).

📊 Real-Time Diagnostics

• Built-in singleton logger with color-coded output in VS Code's Output Panel.
• Real-time progress tracking during template generation.
• Detailed error messages with actionable suggestions.

💡 No more guessing which namespace to use or where to put the file. The extension knows your project structure.

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🖼️ Preview

📹 Watch how it works in action:

➤ Creating a Window

➤ Creating an UserControl

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⚙️ Configuration

Customize logging behavior via VS Code settings:

{
  "avaloniaTemplates.logLevel": "info"
}

Available levels:

• debug — All logs (ideal for development)
• info — Default — Shows creation steps
• warn — Only warnings and errors
• error — Critical issues only
• none — Silent mode

💬 To access settings: Ctrl+Shift+P → “Preferences: Open Settings (JSON)”

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🛠️ Installation

1. Open VS Code.
2. Go to Extensions (Ctrl+Shift+X).
3. Search for “Avalonia Templates” by ADdy2142.
4. Click Install.

✅ Requirements:

• VS Code 1.91+
• An existing Avalonia project (with .axaml files)
• .NET SDK installed

🔍 Extension activates automatically when you open any .axaml file or have one in your workspace.

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📂 Generated Structure Example

👉 Window Example

When creating a Window named MainWindow inside Views/:

MyAvaloniaApp/
├── Views/
│   └── MainWindow.axaml
├── ViewModels/
│   └── MainWindowViewModel.cs ← Auto-generated!
└── ...

MainWindowViewModel.cs includes:

using System;

namespace MyAvaloniaApp.ViewModels; // ✅ Correct namespace!

public class MainWindowViewModel : ViewModelBase // ✅ Inherited!
{
    public MainWindowViewModel()
    {
        // Initialize properties here
    }
}

👉 UserControl Example

When creating a UserControl named SomeUserControl inside Views/UserControls/:

MyAvaloniaApp/
├── Views/
│   └── UserControls/
│       └── SomeUserControl.axaml
├── ViewModels/
│   └── UserControls/
│       └── SomeUserControlViewModel.cs   ← Auto-generated!
└── ...

SomeUserControlViewModel.cs includes:

using System;
using MyAvaloniaApp.ViewModels; // ✅ Auto using statement!

namespace MyAvaloniaApp.ViewModels.UserControls; // ✅ Correct nested namespace!

public class SomeUserControlViewModel : ViewModelBase // ✅ Inherited!
{
    public SomeUserControlViewModel()
    {
        // Initialize properties or commands here
    }
}

💡 The extension automatically detects if you're creating a UserControl in a subfolder like /Views/UserControls/ and mirrors the structure in /ViewModels/UserControls/ — keeping your MVVM architecture clean and scalable.

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📜 Change Log

See full details in CHANGELOG.md

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🤝 Contributing

Found a bug? Have a feature request?

👉 Open an Issue on GitHub
👨‍💻 Pull requests are welcome!

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📄 License

This project is licensed under the AGPL-3.0-only license — see LICENSE for details.

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Made with ❤️ for Avalonia Developers