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Ambar is a macOS Menu Bar app developed with Xamarin and C#. This project aims to show developing a menu bar app for macOS in C#.

Using Ambar as the base, I was able to buildCarol - a minimal and beautiful lyrics app for macOS. Check it out.

It is for the folks wanting to start developing for macOS/iOS/tvOS/watchOS but do not want to delve into Swift/Obj-C and are already comfortable with C# and .Net technologies.

1. Visual Studio for Mac
2. Xcode

Here is how you can do it -

1. In Xcode, delete Window Controller Scene fromMain.storyboard and provide Storyboard ID to View Controller.
2. Add new entry in info.plist -Application is agent (UIElement) with its value set toYes to make the app behave as a ghost.
3. Create a Menu Bar status item usingCreateStatusItem() method ofNSStatusBar.
4. Handle status bar icon for dark and light theme usingTemplate property ofNSImage.
5. Handle event handling of status item usingSelector class ofObjCRuntime.
6. Show a popover usingNSPopover and itsShow() method.
7. Make popover show on demand and hide when user moves on usingNSEvent and a custom class.
8. In Xcode, add a button to View Controller and create an actionQuitApplication bycontrol + drag. In VS, callTerminate method ofNSApplication.

Unless stated otherwise, everything is done in Visual Studio for Mac.

• Add a Contextual Menu to show options.
• Add aLaunch at Login setting.
• Add aAbout window.

If you think this project can be improved to show more of what can be done using Xamarin and C#, you are welcome to contribute. If you build something epic using it, just let meknow.