CODEWITHSUNDEEP
c#iosvisual-studioxamarin
Owen
Owen

Reputation: 303

xamarin for visual studio not showing simulator list

I'm pretty new to xamarin, tried to run a sample application (IOS). But Visual Studio says: "Please select a valid device before running the application"

I know on the IOS toolbar, there should be option to select which device to simulate (list of supported IOS devices like iphone 6, 5s etc), but I don't get that.

EDIT: To be more precise, TARGET IOS Device not shown on IOS Tool bar

Upvotes: 25

Views: 29598

Answers (9)

Ben Arceneaux
Ben Arceneaux

Reputation: 185

My issue was that I needed to log into my Apple developer account in XCode again. For some reason it was showing an error state in XCode>Preferences>Account

I logged into my account again then clicked the "download manual" button and now the devices show up in VS.

Upvotes: 0

HEDGEWIZARDS
HEDGEWIZARDS

Reputation: 151

If you're using the latest XCode version, be sure it's compatible with your Xamarin.iOS and Visual Studio. For me, XCode 13 came out a few days ago and wasn't compatible with the latest Visual Studio. You can download an older version of XCode at https://developer.apple.com/download/more/, just be sure to change visual studio to point to the downgraded version in Visual Studio > Preferences > SDK Locations > Apple

Upvotes: 2

Saamer
Saamer

Reputation: 5099

This has started helping me out a lot with VS for Mac when all other options have failed!

  • Quit VS for Mac
  • Run this in your terminal: sudo xcode-select --switch /Applications/Xcode.app
  • Reopen solution in VS for Mac, and you should be able to see the option

Upvotes: 0

Renji
Renji

Reputation: 165

Once in a while I always used to have this issue and solves it by starting Xcode first and then opening VS after. But recently it became consistent after Xcode 12.5 update. So as a trial, I uninstalled VS and reinstalled and now this workaround also stopped working. It's very annoying and there is a bug already reported to Microsoft to fix this.

The solution that worked for me is to

  1. Create a multi platform sample project in VS, and viola! I could see all my simulators in my sample project.
  2. Now, close this solution (no need to close VS) and open your solution. All your simulators are back.

Unfortunately, you always have to open your sample sln first (but no need to create new sln every time) whenever you want to open your solution. But it solves the problem.

Upvotes: 4

baskren
baskren

Reputation: 1232

Another possible cause: Mistakes in editing your iOS platform project's info.plist can cause this to happen.

Upvotes: 0

Venu Gopal Tewari
Venu Gopal Tewari

Reputation: 5876

  1. Quit Visual Studio.
  2. Open your XCode.
  3. Restart Visual Studio.
  4. Select your ios app > Debug > "Now you can see list of simulators"
  5. Quit Xcode.

OR If above steps do not work then try adding new build configuration as shown in following image by selecting iphoneSimulator.

enter image description here

Upvotes: 9

Judy007
Judy007

Reputation: 5860

I had a similar issue. However, I was able to resolve it by going to XCode>Preferences>Accounts>ViewDetails>Download all. This caused visual studio to now display my device IOS name in the dropdown menu.

Upvotes: 1

Andreas Reiff
Andreas Reiff

Reputation: 8404

I had the same problem a year back - please check the following:

  • XCode is installed
  • you have started XCode once (to accept license agreement)
  • Xamarin Build Host is installed
  • Visual Studio and Mac Build Host are connected
  • Simulators work on MAC-side when started with XCode (just use a sample project)
  • Check that you are using latest versions of Xamarin (often, there are major bugs in intermediate versions of Xamarin that are updated relatively quickly), also check that they are compatible with your XCode version and that VS and Mac versions are compatible (only certain versions can cooperate)
  • using non-latest versions on Mac side can help (e. g. new XCode releases often are unsupported for a few days till there is an update on Xamarin side)
  • Make sure that iOS project is selected for start
  • Sometimes, you need to re-establish connection with Build host for things to work properly
  • Sometimes, you need to restart your systems
  • You got correct licenses (you need Business or Enterprise on both Windows and Mac)

I think for me it was outdated versions and a hickup in the software, after a reboot it worked.

Upvotes: 21

Stuart
Stuart

Reputation: 764

Are you sure that the device is connected to the right machine? When I have a VM open on my iMac, I get prompted for which machine I want to connect a device to.

Also make sure that you have Debug and iPhone Simulator selected.

Upvotes: -2

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