Microsoft WinApp CLI 0.8 Adds WinUI DevTools for UI Inspection by Developers and AI Agents
AI coding · AI assistants
Microsoft has released WinApp CLI 0.8, introducing experimental WinUI DevTools. The tool allows developers and AI agents to inspect running WinUI 3 UI components, visual trees, layout properties, and source XAML line numbers, while adding live UI tweaking, UI annotations, ETW performance profiling, and C++ project packaging.
Microsoft has released WinApp CLI 0.8, introducing the experimental WinUI DevTools feature to assist developers and AI agents in creating, running, debugging, and packaging Windows applications from terminal environments. When launching a WinUI project, DevTools inspects visual tree hierarchies, properties, data bindings, and layouts, displaying corresponding XAML file paths and line numbers when identifiable. Developers can adjust properties like width, spacing, or color for real-time testing, though changes do not write back to source code and reset on restart. The tool supports WinUI 3 applications written in C# and C++. WinApp CLI 0.8 also introduces UI annotations allowing developers to leave change requests that AI agents can inspect, map to source code, and update via the command line. Additional updates include ETW-based performance profiling for XAML layout and rendering, Visual Studio C++ build and MSIX packaging support, and enhanced UI screen recording.
Key takeaways
- WinApp CLI 0.8 introduces experimental WinUI DevTools to inspect WinUI 3 visual trees, properties, and XAML source locations.
- Supports real-time UI property adjustments for live testing and adds persistent UI annotations readable by AI agents.
- Integrates ETW performance tracking for XAML parsing and rendering, though Microsoft notes it does not reflect GPU time or frame rate.
- Expands Visual Studio C++ project support for build, run, MSIX packaging, and isolated package identities.
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