Android Designer is not showing in Visual Studio Xamarin

Question

I'm trying to use the android designer in in an Android App. When I click on my *.axml file it only opens the xml portion of it. The android designer does not show.

Things I've tried:

1. Uninstalling and reinstalling Xamarin for VS 2015
2. Repairing VS 2015
3. Right-clicking the axml file and using open with (Android designer is not shown as an option). If I try to use 'Android Layout file (Defualt)' I get the error message "The file cannot be opened with the selected editor. Please choose another editor."
4. Creating a new blank Android App
5. I've checked the Xamarin extensions and they are all up-to-date.

Answer 1

This can happen when the AXML file you created is not inside the Resources/layout folder of your Xamarin.Android project. It is essential for layout (AXML) files to be there for the designer to work properly, as it is an important Android convention on which the designer stands.