Previewing layout XML files with Android Studio

If you are interested in previewing/designing layout XML files beyond XML code, you can leverage the various display modes in Android Studio.

Inspect your layout XML file of interest with the following steps:

1. Open Android Studio and create a New Project of type Phone and Tablet > No Activity.
2. Once the project loads, right-click on the res folder in the Android Studio project navigator and choose New > Activity > Empty Views Activity from the menu. The layout name defaults to activity_main.xml, which you can keep. Hit Finish.

3. Double-click on the newly created res/layout/activity_main.xml file to open the file.
4. Click the Split icon in the top right corner of Android Studio to also show the XML source along with the designer.

5. Resolve any dependencies and errors that may appear:

• Copy the layout XML file of interest from your .NET for Android app and paste in Android Studio, updating the contents of activity_main.xml. If your XML file references strings, values, or any other resources in strings.xml, colors.xml, or other resource files, be sure to also copy/paste the relevant files from your .NET for Android app into the resource files in Android Studio.
• Check and resolve any errors that may appear in the XML file. (Note: Custom controls aren't supported and will throw an error, so you'll need to remove them, or perhaps replace them with a placeholder control (e.g. TextView) of the same size as a stand-in.)

6. The designer pane will show the UI preview and you can use Android Studio features like the designer view, blueprint view, and property editor to make UI updates.

7. When you're ready, copy/paste any updated files back to your original XML source!