Run the sample app: HoloLens - Unity (C#)

In this quickstart, you'll run the Azure Spatial Anchors sample app for HoloLens using Unity (C#). Spatial Anchors is a cross-platform developer service that allows you to create mixed reality experiences with objects that persist their location across devices over time. When you're finished, you'll have a HoloLens app built with Unity that can save and recall a spatial anchor.

You'll learn how to:

  • Create a Spatial Anchors account.
  • Prepare Unity build settings.
  • Configure the Spatial Anchors account identifier and account key.
  • Export the HoloLens Visual Studio project.
  • Deploy the app and run it on a HoloLens device.

If you don't have an Azure subscription, create an Azure free account before you begin.

Prerequisites

To complete this quickstart:

  • You need a HoloLens device with developer mode enabled. For HoloLens 2 the Windows 10 May 2020 Update or later must be installed on the device. To update to the latest release on HoloLens, open the Settings app, go to Update & Security, and then select Check for updates.
  • You need a Windows computer with Visual Studio 2019 or later installed. Your Visual Studio installation must include the Universal Windows Platform development workload and the Windows 10 SDK (10.0.18362.0 or newer) component. You must also install Git for Windows and Git LFS.
  • You need to have Unity installed. For supported versions and required capabilities, visit the Unity project setup page.

Create a Spatial Anchors resource

Go to the Azure portal.

On the left pane, select Create a resource.

Use the search box to search for Spatial Anchors.

Screenshot showing the results of a search for Spatial Anchors.

Select Spatial Anchors, and then select Create.

On the Spatial Anchors Account pane, do the following:

  • Enter a unique resource name by using regular alphanumeric characters.

  • Select the subscription that you want to attach the resource to.

  • Create a resource group by selecting Create new. Name it myResourceGroup, and then select OK.

    A resource group is a logical container into which Azure resources, such as web apps, databases, and storage accounts, are deployed and managed. For example, you can choose to delete the entire resource group in one simple step later.

  • Select a location (region) in which to place the resource.

  • Select Create to begin creating the resource.

Screenshot of the Spatial Anchors pane for creating a resource.

After the resource is created, the Azure portal shows that your deployment is complete.

Screenshot showing that the resource deployment is complete.

Select Go to resource. You can now view the resource properties.

Copy the resource's Account ID value into a text editor for later use.

Screenshot of the resource properties pane.

Also copy the resource's Account Domain value into a text editor for later use.

Screenshot showing the resource's account domain value.

Under Settings, select Access Key. Copy the Primary key value, Account Key, into a text editor for later use.

Screenshot of the Keys pane for the account.

Download sample project and import SDK

Clone Samples Repository

Clone the samples repository by running the following commands:

git clone https://github.com/Azure/azure-spatial-anchors-samples.git
cd ./azure-spatial-anchors-samples

Import ASA SDK

Follow the instructions here to download and import the ASA SDK packages required for the HoloLens platform.

Configure Unity

In Unity, open the project in the Unity folder. Unity might prompt you about a difference between the version in the project and the version that's installed on your machine. This warning is okay, as long as your version of Unity Editor is newer than the one that the project was created with. If your version is newer, select Continue. If your version is older than the one the project needs, select Quit, and upgrade your Unity Editor.

Screenshot of the Unity pane.

Open Build Settings by selecting File > Build Settings.

In the Platform section, select Universal Windows Platform. Change the Target Device to HoloLens.

Select Switch Platform to change the platform to Universal Windows Platform. Unity might prompt you to install UWP support components if they're missing.

Screenshot of the Unity Build Settings pane - HoloLens

Close the Build Settings window.

Configure the account information

The next step is to configure the app to use your account information. You copied the Account Key, Account ID, and Account Domain values to a text editor earlier, in the "Create a Spatial Anchors resource" section.

On the Project pane, go to Assets\AzureSpatialAnchors.SDK\Resources.

Select SpatialAnchorConfig. On the Inspector pane, enter the Account Key as the value for Spatial Anchors Account Key, the Account ID as the value for Spatial Anchors Account Id, and the Account Domain as the value for Spatial Anchors Account Domain.

Export the HoloLens Visual Studio project

Open Build Settings by selecting File > Build Settings.

Under Scenes In Build, ensure all the scenes have a check mark next to them.

Select Build. In the dialog box, select a folder in which to export the HoloLens Visual Studio project.

When the export is complete, a folder containing the exported HoloLens project will appear.

Deploy the HoloLens application

In the folder, double-click HelloAR U3D.sln to open the project in Visual Studio.

Change the Solution Configuration to Release, change the Solution Platform to x86, and select Device from the deployment target options.

If using HoloLens 2, use ARM64 as the Solution Platform, instead of x86.

Visual Studio configuration

Turn on the HoloLens device, sign in, and connect the device to the PC by using a USB cable.

Select Debug > Start debugging to deploy your app and start debugging.

In the app, select BasicDemo using the arrows, then press the Go! button to run the demo. Follow the instructions to place and recall an anchor.

Screenshot 1 Screenshot 2 Screenshot 3 Screenshot 4

In Visual Studio, stop the app by selecting either Stop Debugging or Shift+F5.

Clean up resources

In the preceding steps, you created Azure resources in a resource group. If you don't expect to need these resources in the future, you can delete them by deleting the resource group.

From the Azure portal menu or Home page, select Resource groups. Then, on the Resource groups page, select myResourceGroup.

On the myResourceGroup page, make sure that the listed resources are the ones you want to delete.

Select Delete resource group, type myResourceGroup in the text box to confirm, and then select Delete.

Next steps

In this quickstart, you created a Spatial Anchors account. You then configured and deployed an app to save and recall spatial anchors. To learn more about how to improve the app so it can share spatial anchors with other devices, continue to the next tutorial.