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Windows 11 is currently undergoing a massive, under-the-hood reconstruction. Internally dubbed "Project K2," this initiative is tasked with gutting "AI slop" and legacy overhead to make the OS feel native again.
But to make Windows feel fast, third-party developers need to embrace native applications and use the WinUI 3 framework.
The agent has eight skills built-in that help with different parts of app development, such as UI design, reviewing code quality, testing UI, and packaging apps. Another skill helps migrate a WPF app to WinUI.
Because of the new AI agent, your favorite and most-used Windows apps could soon see the same performance boost that's on the way to core parts of Windows 11, at least in the long run. The AI agent is part of a widespread effort to increase adoption of WinUI.
Third-party developers have been able to make WinUI 3 apps for quite some time, but the new tools Microsoft has in the works, including templates that I touch on more later, make it easier for developers to embrace the framework.
Microsoft claims that the new agent skills for app development "enable your agent to take your ideas to a native Windows app in minutes." That's a bold claim, and robust applications will obviously take more than a few minutes to make, but lowering the barrier of entry to WinUI app development could be enough to convince more developers to make native Windows apps.
The specialized nature of the AI agent results in more than 70% fewer tokens being used. The winui-search and winmd-cli tools rely on a local library of documentation to find relevant answers and solutions. That decrease should streamline app development while also reducing costs.
WinUI is the native user interface (UI) framework for Windows apps. It's one of the key parts of the Windows K2 initiative to improve the performance of Windows 11. Core parts of Windows 11 will be rebuilt with WinUI, such as the Start menu.
Microsoft is also improving the WinUI framework. Earlier this week, software engineer Beth Pan shared that Microsoft's mission "is to make WinUI 3 the best native UI platform for Windows experiences and apps and performance is at the heart of that effort."
Microsoft engineers currently use File Explorer and Notepad as benchmarks for the improvements to WinUI. Launch time for those apps has already gotten better when using WinUI, though the update to the framework is still in development.
Third-party developers that build apps with WinUI should see performance improvements as well, which helps make the overall experience of Windows 11 better for users.
Improving app development with WinUI templates
Earlier this week, Microsoft introduced dotnet new WinUI templates that allow developers to jump into native app creation. The templates allow developers to create WinUI apps without needing to go through Visual Studio.
The templates, which are in preview, follow the Fluent Design pattern. They give developers a clean starting point for native app development and cover the core parts of apps, such as navigation and tabs.
Developers can launch unpackaged apps directly from the command line, meaning they do not have to use Visual Studio or create a manual Add-AppxPackage.
While not having to use Visual Studio is a welcome option, many developers like that tool. The templates are on the way to Visual Studio as well.
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