Why Mono for Android?

I have gotten a few questions asking why a developer should use Mono for Android (aka MonoDroid).  I thought I would just do a brain dump on my thoughts on this.

Java Developers are looking at MonoDroid and wondering "Why"?  They see that the core of Android is Linux, an open source operating system, with a bunch of passionette people behind it.  Java developers have a free runtime, they have a free IDE (Eclips) to develop with, they have a free SDK to develop with, they view Java as an easy language to learn (and I'm not debating any of these points).  Why would anyone want something else?  Let me introduce myself, I'm Wally McClure.  I'm a .NET developer, and I think you have a product that is being accepted into the marketplace.  For a developer to be productive, they need a language that they understand, an IDE that helps them to be successful, and knowledge of the underlying operating system (the -isms).

• I'd like to "get me some of that."  I'd like to be able to write programs that run on your platform.  I'd like to do that with the least amount of pain possible.  I'd like to reuse as much of my existing .NET knowledge as I can.  Mono, the open source implementation of .NET runs on a variety of platforms.  I can take my existing knowledge of C#/.NET and apply it to Android.  This solves my problem of the language.

• I'd like to use my existing tools as much as possible.  I've invested time, money, and energy in learning Visual Studio .NET.  I am productive in my existing environment, why should I have to add a new environment to program in.  Because Mono for Android integrates in with my existing IDE, the problem of having an IDE that I understand has been solved.

• Now, ultimately, I still have to learn the Android-isms to be productive.  We've already faught the Java, cross platform wars and we know that writte one run anywhere failed.  I don't think that anything can really help us on this. 

Now, I don't mean to imply that learning the Android-isms is simple.  Its hard.  You have to learn the platform.  There's no getting around that.  Does Mono for Android solve two thirds of my problem?  That would be underestimating the problem of learning the Android-isms.  I do think that it helps with half the problem.  Now that I am up and going, it seems that learning the Android-isms isn't that hard, but I would have had to learn them either way.

Read more: More Wally - Wallace B. McClure  

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