Code Library

With the release of the XtraVerticalGrid Suite, Developer Express introduces an entirely new way to develop elegant and highly functional user interfaces for your Windows Forms applications. Fully optimized for the utmost flexibility, the XtraVerticalGrid Suite will help you build stunning data entry forms with complete control over the information displayed on-screen.

The Suite comes with two controls that generally can be referred to as vertical grids, though their goals are different. The fist - the VerticalGridControl is a data-aware control, which provides an elegant solution to represent data source records as columns. The second control - PropertyGridControl - provides advanced capabilities to display settings of any object at runtime. The solutions implemented in the Suite will help you radically improve the UI of your applications. The control's layout, appearance and behavior settings can be flexibly customized depending upon your needs.

The feature list below offers you a glimpse into the XtraVerticalGrid Suite. The vertical grid controls included in the Suite have many features in common. Any features that are specific to a control are listed in the separate subsections below.



VerticalGridControl Features
• Full ADO+ Support - The VerticalGridControl takes full advantage of all the capabilities built into ADO.NET. With this data access architecture and the separation of internal data modules from data presentation, the control does not use any extra buffers in any of its data loading modes.

• Support for Data Lists - The VerticalGridControl can work with any source which supports the IList, ITypedList or IBindingList interface plus all the inherited interfaces.

• Multiple Layout Styles - These allow you to specify how bound data is represented within the control. You can choose between displaying a single record at a time, multiple records at a time, or a single record using multi-column format.



PropertyGridControl Features
• Binding to Any Object - After the object has been bound, the PropertyGridControl automatically retrieves its public properties and creates rows for all of them. You can then remove particular rows to hide specific fields.

• Support for Categories - Bound object properties can be grouped into categories. Nested categories are also supported.

• Specifying Default Editors to Edit Fields of Particular Types - The control enables you to specify in-place editors to represent and edit values of particular types. For instance, you can specify that the Boolean values will be represented using the CheckEdit control, instead of the standard ComboBox control with the traditional True and False items.

• Assigning Editors to Individual Rows - For any row you can override the default editor by assigning a specific in-place editor from the XtraEditors library.



Common Layout and Customization Features
• Runtime Layout Customization - End-users can customize the vertical grids at runtime in any way they want. They can hide/restore rows and create new data categories using the Customization Form, rearrange rows using drag-and-drop and resize rows

• Save And Load Layouts - This feature allows you to save the control's current layout between application runs, hence save the changes in the layout made by end-users.

• MultipleEditor Rows - A row of this type permits you to display multiple editors in a line.

• Nested Rows - The vertical grids support nested rows. Each row can have child rows, which can also have children, etc.

• Full Drag and Drop Support - The vertical grids support automatic internal drag-and-drop of rows and let you control drag-and-drop via events. You can also implement OLE drag-and-drop to send data from a grid to other controls and vice versa.

• Localization of Interface Elements - Like other Developer Express Windows Forms, the vertical grids use the Localization mechanism which allows you to localize interface elements into your language.



Common In-place Editing Features
• Over 20 Data Editors, which can be used standalone or in-place within the vertical grids.

• Editor Repository - You can setup a single in-place editor, for instance a pick image edit as an editor for a payment type field, and use it for as many vertical grids as you wish. When you use the repository and want to add a different type of credit card payment, you only need to change one in-place editor. See the EditorContainer.ExternalRepository property.



Common Appearance Features
• Various Paint Styles (Office2003, Flat, WindowsXP, Style3D, etc).

• Appearances - A powerful mechanism to control the entire look and feel of the Developer Express Windows Forms controls. You can specify the appearance of almost any visual element and even apply it conditionally via an event.

• Skins Support - Skins will bring a striking look and feel to your applications, far beyond the normal painting standards.

• Extended Gradient and AlphaBlending Support - You can apply gradient and alpha blending to any grid element at design time or runtime. The XtraVerticalGridBlending component help you customize alpha channels for various visual elements of the controls.

• Full Custom Draw Support - allows you to manually paint almost any element of the vertical grids.



Common Design-Time Features
• Advanced Design-Time Support - The XtraVerticalGrid Suite ships with an easy-to-use design time editor that allows you to control virtually every aspect of a vertical grid without having to write a single line of code. Instead of writing code to manage the appearance, you can concentrate on writing code to handle the really "interesting" tasks.

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