Dotnet by Example: Minimal required software for MRTK2 development for HoloLens 2 and Immersive headsets

29 July 2019

Minimal required software for MRTK2 development for HoloLens 2 and Immersive headsets

Intro

A short one this time – and codeless to. You see, next Saturday I will be giving an workshop for MixUG Netherlands about development with the Mixed Reality Toolkit 2 for Immersive headsets, together with my colleague, partner in crime and fellow MVP Alexander Meijers. One of the things that came up preparing for this workshop was what you would actually need to develop with the Mixed Reality Toolkit 2. Since ye olden days of the HoloToolkit, quite a few things have changed – Unity, the minimal OS version, and there’s even a new version of Visual Studio. So I set out to complete a minimal shopping list with a few optional items. Fortunately, our friends over at Microsoft Azure make it quite simple to spin up a totally pristine machine so you don’t run into the typical developer machine issues – multiple versions of Visual Studio with different workloads and a myriad of Unity versions – which makes it hard to tell sometimes what is required for what app.

OS version

Easy one. Windows 10, 1809 or (recommended) 1903. Everything I tested, I tested on Windows 10 Pro

Visual Studio

You will need Visual Studio 2019 community edition. 2017 will work too, but is much slower. Download Visual Studio 2019 community from this link and choose the following work loads:

UWP development with optional components USB connectivity and C++ (V142) UWP tools checked
Game development with Unity with the optional component 2018.3 64-bit editor unchecked

In images:

Make sure you install Visual Studio before Unity.

Offline installer

A fun trick – if you want to make an offline installer for the community edition for these particular workloads, open a command prompt after downloading the installer, and type (on one line):

vs_community.exe --layout c:\vsinstaller
--add Microsoft.VisualStudio.Workload.ManagedGame
--add Microsoft.VisualStudio.Workload.Universal
--add Microsoft.VisualStudio.Component.Windows10SDK.IpOverUsb
--add Microsoft.VisualStudio.ComponentGroup.UWP.VC --lang en-US

In c:\vsinstaller you will then find a complete install ‘layout’ for all the necessary components. Might be useful if you want to prepare multiple computers.

Unity

2018.4.2f1, taken from ProjectSettings/ProjectVersion.txt in the mrtk_development branch. This particular version can be downloaded directly from this link.

Choose as minimal components

Unity 2018.4.2f1
UWP Build Support

Mind you – this sets you op for HoloLens 2 and Windows Mixed Reality Immersive headsets only.

Optional – HoloLens 2 emulator

I have already written extensively about it. You can get it here. Be aware that it requires Hyper-V being installed. If you have installed Windows 10 1903, it will run right away. On 1809 you will need some trickery.

Conclusion

It’s not that hard to get up and running for MRTK2 development for HoloLens 2 and Windows Mixed Reality Immersive headsets. And now you have a nice complete ‘shopping list’ for when you want to prepare your PC.

No comments:

Feedback, comments and tokens of appreciation

If you spot things that are incorrect, or if you don't understand what I mean, please drop a comment on the offending article and I will help you ASAP. You can e-mail me at joostvanschaik at outlook dot com or contact me via twitter.

If you find the information on this blog useful (and apparently some 16000 people per month do so on average) please let me know as well, that encourages me to keep doing this. Or do tell others - that made me an MVP; who knows what more it might bring ;-P

About getting support

Yes, I am more than willing to answer your questions
Yes, I always read all comments and respond to them if they make sense
Yes, I am always willing to help you out if you are stuck

But…

I am not clairvoyant
I won't write the complete app for your assignment due in three days ;)
I cannot deduce from a few lines of code or short description how your 1000+ lines project looks like, what you try to do and where things go wrong.
I am just a simple developer like you who needs to look at code, bing stuff and use the debugger
I am just a regular guy with a job and my time is limited so it won’t be always today. Sometimes not even tomorrow.
English is not my first language either

But, if something does not work and you really need help and you do this:

Make a simple solution that shows your problem with as little other stuff in it as possible
Put it on a OneDrive or some other place where I can download it from
Explain as clearly as possible what your problem is

I will help you to the best of my abilities. Deal?

Disclaimer and legal stuff

Although I take great care in providing quality samples, all postings, articles and/or files on this site are provided "AS IS" with no warranties, and confer no rights. The views expressed on this blog are strictly my own and do not necessarily reflect the views of my employer, or anyone else on the planet for that matter.

I usually make original content, sometimes building upon other people's work. Sometimes I explain things that can be found elsewhere because I felt what I read was not clear enough for my limited mind so I explain it the way it finally clicked with me. In all cases I take great pains to be sure to link to people or articles who deserve the credit. If you think I have shortchanged you on the credits please let me know.

Please note, I do not work for Microsoft and while I proudly wear the title of "Microsoft Most Valueable Professional", my opinions, files offered, etc. do not represent, are approved of, endorsed by or paid for by Microsoft. The only power behind it is me and my sometimes runaway passion for parts of Microsoft's technology.