Quite often, you will need to allow your user to drill-down data from yearly data to monthly or from categories to individual items. Now it’s very easy with our new concept which gives you freedom to create unlimited levels of drill-down charts from a single data source in minutes.

In this blog post, I want to show an example of drilling down chart data, i.e. to display master-detail data in the same chart, by clicking a point of the first series will let another series shown, which represents detailed data related to the selected point. This is critical for creating interesting and fun charts to interact with. This blog entry includes basic knowledge of what you can do with our chart right out of the box. See the following screenshot for the drilling down chart that we want to create.

To get started, we use the Child properties in UXChart to specify which chart that we want to display as detail of origin chart. Specifically, all charting collections must be defined in View in a first place. On first load, you are allowed to display one chart only, and the others’ visibility must be set to collapse. See the code below:

<dataVisualisation:UXChart x:Name="Chart1" Visibility="Visible" Child="{Binding ElementName=Chart2}"
                        DrillDownCommand="{Binding DrillDownCommand}">
</dataVisualisation:UXChart>

<dataVisualisation:UXChart x:Name="Chart2" Visibility="Collapsed"  >
</dataVisualisation:UXChart>

Next, we need to hook our custom command to control the drilldown action, we called it DrillDownCommand.

public DelegateCommand DrillDownCommand { get; set; }

And then we assign DrillDownCommand to some execute the method in our ViewModel.

this.DrillDownCommand = new DelegateCommand(ExecuteDrillDown);

In the execute method, we can initialize the data from the data source and retrieve detail information about the chart itself.

private void ExecuteDrillDown(object parameter)
{
   UXChartDrillDownCommandArgs args = parameter as UXChartDrillDownCommandArgs;

   if (args.Level == 1)
   {
     Data parent = args.DataPointContext as Data;
     if (parent != null)
     {
       InitializeDataByArea(parent.Area);
     }
   }
}

In conclusion, with simple implementation, we already make drill down function very simple and effortless. Now feel free to try and make your very own drill down chart. There’s unlimited level that you can figure out and explore.

For more information about our ClientUI control in Silverlight & WPF, please refer to the online documentation. You can download our sample here. Feel free to drop us any questions or feedback.

Till we meet again.

Cheers,
Yanes

The arrival of Windows 8 adds more choices to the platform stack that mobile developers should consider. So my question is, do you plan to build Windows 8 apps, or perhaps you already built one? As we’re planning our roadmap ahead, we’d love to hear from you – which platforms will you build your next apps on, the challenges you’re facing, and what tools you need to get your jobs done right.

Join our 2013 product survey and place your vote so we can align our next product roadmap to your development needs.

Your participation is an effective way to present your thoughts and opinions about our products and service to the management of Intersoft Solutions. I do believe that your valuable feedback would be very useful to help us improve our products and services in the future.

If you have any questions or technical difficulties, please don’t hesitate to drop an email to me at martin@intersoftpt.com.

Thank you for your time and participation.

Regards,
Martin

Last year I posted an article which showed how to store the files which are uploaded using UXFileUpload (ClientUI control for Silverlight and WPF) in database. In this article, I will show a similar scenario which can be done using WebFileUploader, a member of Intersoft Solutions ASP.NET controls.

WebFileUploader is an easy to use; high performance and advanced file upload component which allows you to upload multiple files without page refresh. WebFileUploader uses 100% HTML technology for all its features, and fully supports all modern browsers including Firefox, Safari, Chrome and Opera. Using 100% HTML technology means that WebFileUploader doesn’t require Flash plug-in to support multiple files uploading and many other features.

This scenario, to store the uploaded files in database, can be divided to two parts. The first part is to configure WebFileUploader for IIS application; and the other part, using server-side code to process uploaded files and store them into database.

To configure WebFileUploader for IIS application

Some configuration is needed in the web.config to run WebFileUploader in IIS. The list below shows how to configure WebFileUploader for IIS 7 application.

1. By default, ASP.NET application restricts maximum request length to 4 MB. To enable our application to accept larger files, please configure the maxRequestLength in web.config to higher value. The maxRequestLength value is measured in kilobytes. Here is a snippet to increase your file size to 100MB.

   <configuration>
     <system.web>
       <httpRuntime maxRequestLength="102400" />
     </system.web>
   </configuration>

2. Add WebFileUploader handler to <handlers> section under <system.webServer>. Here is the snippet.

   <add name="WebFileUploaderHttpHandler" verb="GET"
     path="WebFileUploaderHttpHandler.axd"
     type="ISNet.WebUI.WebTextEditor.WebFileUploaderHttpHandler, ISNet.WebUI.WebTextEditor"
     preCondition="integratedMode" />

3. Add WebFileUploader module to <modules> section under <system.webServer> in our project web.config. Here is the snippet.

   <add name="WebFileUploaderHttpModule" preCondition="managedHandler"
     type="ISNet.WebUI.WebTextEditor.WebFileUploaderHttpModule, ISNet.WebUI.WebTextEditor" />

4. Set maxAllowedContentLength to a higher value, which is measured in bytes, to 100MB in web.config. This attribute specifies the maximum length of content in a request. The default value is 30000000, which is approximately 28.6 MB.

   <system.webServer>
     <security>
       <requestFiltering>
         <requestLimits maxAllowedContentLength="104857600" />
       </requestFiltering>
     </security>
   </system.webServer>

5. Unlock the mode override in applicationHost.config. Open IIS 7 application configuration file, the default location is in C:windowssystem32inetsrvconfig, and change the overrideModeDefault to Allow.

   <section name="requestFiltering" overrideModeDefault="Allow" />

Save the changes and then try to upload a file. If WebFileUploader has been successfully uploaded the file to the designated folder, it means that we are on half way to achieve the goal and ready to proceed to the next step.

Using server-side code to process uploaded files and store them into database

A database, called Files.mdf, is added into the App_Data folder of the web project. This database has Files table which consists of following fields.

A Stored Procedure, sprocFilesInsertSingleItem, will be used to insert a single item of file into Files.mdf database.

INSERT INTO Files
(
	Id,
	FileUrl,
	FileData,
	OriginalName
)
VALUES
(
	@id,
	@FileUrl,
	@FileData,
	@originalName
)

Next, we are going to use the OnAfterUpload server-side event of WebFileUploader. It is the server-side event which fired when a file upload is succeeded. Generally, there are three processes to be performed on this event.

• Read and manipulate the uploaded file using FileStream class.
• Invoke and execute sprocFilesInsertSingleItem stored procedure to store the uploaded file on Files.mdf database.
• Delete the specified file from the UploadPath folder.

protected void WebFileUploader1_AfterUpload(object sender, ISNet.WebUI.WebTextEditor.WebFileUploaderFileEventArgs e)
{
    byte[] fileData = ReadFile(e.WebFileUploadInfo.Path + "\" + e.WebFileUploadInfo.FileName);
    string originalName = e.WebFileUploadInfo.FileName;

    using (SqlConnection mySqlConnection = new SqlConnection(@"Data Source=.SQLEXPRESS;AttachDbFilename=|DataDirectory|Files.mdf;Integrated Security=True;Connect Timeout=30;User Instance=True"))
    {
        // Set up the Command object
        SqlCommand myCommand = new SqlCommand("sprocFilesInsertSingleItem", mySqlConnection);
        myCommand.CommandType = CommandType.StoredProcedure;

        // Set up the ID parameter
        SqlParameter prmId = new SqlParameter("@id", SqlDbType.UniqueIdentifier);

        Guid id = Guid.NewGuid();
        prmId.Value = id;
        myCommand.Parameters.Add(prmId);

        // Set up the FileUrl parameter
        SqlParameter prmFileUrl = new SqlParameter("@fileUrl", SqlDbType.NVarChar, 255);

        prmFileUrl.Value = DBNull.Value;
        myCommand.Parameters.Add(prmFileUrl);

        // Set up the FileData parameter
        SqlParameter prmFileData = new SqlParameter("@fileData ", SqlDbType.VarBinary);

        prmFileData.Value = fileData;
        prmFileData.Size = fileData.Length;
        myCommand.Parameters.Add(prmFileData);

        // Set up the OriginalName parameter
        SqlParameter prmOriginalName = new SqlParameter("@originalName", SqlDbType.NVarChar, 50);
        prmOriginalName.Value = e.WebFileUploadInfo.FileName;
        myCommand.Parameters.Add(prmOriginalName);

        // Execute the command, and clean up.
        mySqlConnection.Open();
        bool result = myCommand.ExecuteNonQuery() > 0;
        mySqlConnection.Close();
    }

    File.Delete(e.WebFileUploadInfo.Path + "\" + e.WebFileUploadInfo.FileName);
}

private static byte[] ReadFile(string filePath)
{
    byte[] buffer;
    FileStream fileStream = new FileStream(filePath, FileMode.Open, FileAccess.Read);

    try
    {
        int length = (int)fileStream.Length; // get file length
        buffer = new byte[length];           // create buffer
        int count;                           // actual number of bytes read
        int sum = 0;                         // total number of bytes read

        // read until Read method returns 0 (end of the stream has been reached)
        while ((count = fileStream.Read(buffer, sum, length - sum)) > 0)
        {
            sum += count; // sum is a buffer offset for next reading
        }
    }
    finally
    {
        fileStream.Close();
    }

    return buffer;
}

That’s it! Now the files uploaded by WebFileUploader control will be stored in database. It’s pretty easy and straightforward, don’t you think so?

Click here to download the sample and feel free to drop me a line in the comment box if you find this post useful.

Today, we have posted an update to the WebUI Studio 2012 R2 installer which addressed a few glitches related to samples and installation. In addition, the installer “refresh” also includes newer product builds across ASP.NET, Silverlight and WPF tools for enhanced cross-platform compatibility and improved reliability. It’s highly recommended to install WebUI Studio 2012 R2 using the latest installer which you can download here.

The installer “refresh” includes numerous updates that are focused around the new technical samples for Silverlight and WPF. In case you didn’t aware, we now include comprehensive technical samples starting from this release. The difference with the live samples is that technical samples are strongly focused on the product features – and there are no fancy stuff such as decorator graphics or complex styling – so you can quickly and easily discover the “how-to” and knowledge to implement a particular feature of the new products.

If you haven’t seen the technical samples yet, now is a good time to take a look at it. It’s installed by default, and can be found in the Intersoft WebUI Studio program group under the respective platform group. In this release, the technical samples include over 150 samples for charting and 40 samples for the other new products such as Query Builder, Property Grid and BreadCrumb.

Each feature of the new product is covered in each separate sample, making it easy for you to learn the context of a particular feature. With simple interface and intuitive navigation, getting around with the samples is easy and fast – you should try it for yourself.

Note that the technical samples is available in both Silverlight and WPF platform with the same codebase. The WPF samples demonstrate that the same features available in Silverlight are also working flawlessly in WPF – from the basic features to the animation and user experiences. Here’s the screenshot for the technical samples in WPF.

Again, the technical samples is installed by default when you install WebUI Studio for Silverlight and WPF, so there’s no additional download needed. It can be found in the Intersoft WebUI Studio program group under the respective platform group.

I hope you enjoyed the comprehensive learning resources we added in this release. Any questions or feedback are highly welcomed. Thank you for reading!

First of all, Happy New Year! I hope you enjoyed building apps with our tools in the past year, and we look forward to work with you again in 2013! We’ve plenty of exciting new products that we’re planning in this new year, and we’ll update our roadmap shortly in the next few weeks.

In case you missed the news, we’ve shipped the 2012 R2 volume release last month. You can download it here, and check out the what’s new list here. In addition to the new products listed in the “what’s new” list, the R2 release actually ships much more new features and enhancements that weren’t listed in the website. For instances, we also introduced sophisticated “cell locking” feature in UXGridView, brand-new theme manager, performance improvements in all combobox-variant controls, new usability feature in UXRibbon, and much more.

Where can I see all the new features and enhancements, you might asked. It’s in the documentation that you can access online today. The online product documentation features lightweight navigation interface similar to those in Help Viewer. You can easily browse through each topic from the left-side tree navigation, or from the breadcrumb at the top.

I’ve compiled several interesting topics that I think you should check out:

• What’s New in ClientUI 8
• Theme Manager Overview
• UXChart Overview
• UXBreadCrumb Overview
• UXQueryBuilder Overview
• UXPropertyGrid Overview
• Walkthrough and How-to Topics

In addition to the online documentation, we’ve also recently updated the online samples for ASP.NET. The online samples now reflect the latest release which includes all-new WebDesktop samples demonstrating HTML5 and CSS3 support. In addition, many of the samples have been updated to the latest Modern UI styles.

Among dozens of WebDesktop controls that receive full HTML5 support, one that is quite noteworthy is the WebPaneManager control which undergone major surgery in order to achieve “fluid layout” that works in HTML5 browsers. If you’ve worked with layouting in HTML5, I trust you already foresee the difficulty level to create “fluid layout” that supports dynamic width/height, not to mention the support for nested groups and resizing and other UX features. Luckily, you can easily achieve complex layout now using the enhanced WebPaneManager control. See the following screenshot for example.

The beauty of the new WebPaneManager is that it’s very lightweight – thanks to the revamped layout from TABLE to DIV, and more importantly, it supports combination of fluid and static width/height – all without requiring scripting! This means that when users resize the browser, they’ll see real-time response. We haven’t seen a control with such capabilities thus far in the market, so we’re pleased to be the first delivering such innovative controls to you.

Well, you can check out the WebPaneManager samples and the rest of updated ASP.NET online samples here. Enjoy!

Best,
Jimmy

We’re excited to announce the latest WebUI Studio 2012 R2 release which is now immediately available for download here. In this R2 release, we’ve added dozens of new powerful controls for Silverlight and WPF that users have been waiting for. For ASP.NET, we’ve completely redesigned the new WebDesktop from the ground up to support the latest web standards such as HTML5 and CSS3.

To discover new controls and features that we’ve included in R2 release, you can visit What’s New in 2012 R2. In this blog post, I will share some of the featured reference samples demonstrating the new products, as well as reviewing the key features.

Below are some of the top new samples that go to my favorite list.

1. Sales Dashboard
   UXChart is a collection of advanced charting control coupled with powerful MVVM data-binding capability for your Silverlight and WPF business application. UXChart takes any kind of data and transform them into beautiful charts that can leverage your business presentation.In this sample, UXChart is used to display the sales overview of Northwind’s merchandise over time while demonstrating its selection ability. Notice that there are 4 different types of chart, which are pie, doughnut, smooth lines and multiple series column charts. If you select one of the pie area in the upper left corner chart, the selected pie area exploded as the rest of the charts moves fluently to show the data corresponding to the selected area. Explore the sample.
   
2. Revenue Analysis
   UXChart is created on top of an advanced canvas that provides reliable support for interactivity features such as zooming, panning, and box selection.This sample shows UXChart amazing zoom capability in a Profit / Loss analysis scenario. The zoom options are enabled by default which allows users to easily zoom into specific area of the chart. You can move the zoom slider or scroll your mouse wheel to zoom in/out on the cursor position. See that the content seamlessly shrink and grow while maintaining the perfect gridline thickness thanks to UXChart advanced rendering technique. Pan through your data while maintaining your zoom level by dragging the slider or canvas to any direction. Try double clicking on the chart canvas to activate the step zoom feature. Explore the sample.
3. Sales Drill Down
   UXChart supports data drill down. In a drilldown chart, the data plots in each chart (for example pie slieces in Pie chart or columns in Column chart) act as hotspots to reveal the breakdown values of the selected data. With UXChart’s solid architecture you can even create multiple levels of drilldown.This sample created to showcase UXChart built-in drill down capability in a Product List scenario. Along with presenting exquisite charts, UXChart also pays close attention to every element involved in the charting control in order to bring state-of-the-art user experiences. Enjoy smooth animation as UXChart loads your data for the first time or during value changes. Both axis intervals are capable of shrinking and growing dynamically to cope with fluctuating data during zooming operation. Explore the sample.
4. Hospital Management
   UXChart is a suite of business-oriented charting toolset equipped with a diverse list of chart types. It comes with more than 20 different chart types including bar, column, line, area, smooth line, smooth area, step area, donut, pie, bubble, radar, polar, scatter, stacked bar, stacked column, and more.In this sample, UXChart is used to present a hospital bed management dashboard. The Weekly Accuracy of Discharge Prediction chart shows how UXChart can bring more dynamics in data illustration by customizing the x-axis into percentage display. With UXChart, you don’t have to move your cursor on top of a particular data point to view its value. Try to move your cursor near any data points and the intelligent nearest-point-finder feature will trigger the intuitive tooltips to reveal the exact value behind the chart for accurate data reading. Explore the sample.
5. Web Analytics
   UXChart is engineered from the ground up with solid architecture to ensure blazing-fast performance and maximum scalability. It offers full support for MVVM data binding which unlocks the possibility of real-time chart update within your business application.This sample shows how UXChart can be used to display real-time traffic data and its associated data. With UXChart you don’t have to try hard pointing your cursor in order to read values behind a data point. Try to move your cursor near any data point and the intelligent nearest-point-finder feature will trigger the intuitive tooltips to reveal the exact value behind the chart for accurate data reading. Notice how the tooltip glides smoothly from one data point to another as you move your cursor around. Explore the sample.
6. Housing Filter
   UXQueryBuilder is an advanced data filtering control that allows user to dynamically build complex queries through an intuitive user interface. UXQueryBuilder also supports server-side filtering through QueryDescriptor, FilterDescriptors or client-side filtering through CollectionView. In this sample, uses QueryBuilder to filter a collection of houses in a house finder scenario. Explore the sample.
7. Heritage Property Finder
   UXPropertyGrid is a versatile editor control that displays the properties of an object, which support all kinds of data types including text, boolean, date-time and even advanced data types such as enumeration.UXPropertyGrid allows multiple object properties to be displayed and edited. Therefore, this sample uses this control to edit a collection of house properties. Try holding Shift key while selecting several houses and notice how UXPropertyGrid lists all properties that are common to the two objects.
8. Customer List
   UXPropertyGrid provides built-in data binding support to read property values from a data source. With full MVVM support, you can easily populate a data collection property from a ViewModel. In addition, the component model annotation support allows the control to read the property’s settings automatically based on the specified attributes, such as the display caption, format string, maximum length, and many others.
9. Windows-style File Explorer
   UXBreadCrumb is an advanced navigation control that allows users to easily navigate between pages, with the familiar look of Windows Explorer navigation. UXBreadCrumb combines the address bar and menu functionality in an elegant single interface, enabling users to perform navigation in simple point-and-click manner.This sample shows how to emulate Windows-style file explorer while highlighting UXBreadCrumb’s powerful features such as load-on-demand and full MVVM support. Try to navigate around different nodes and notice that the icon and address are automatically synchronized to the current navigation target. Thanks to smart resizing feature, UXBreadCrumb automatically resize and adjust the URI into ellipsis text when the URI is exceeding the limit.
10. Help Viewer
    UXBreadCrumb unleashes its maximum potential when a sitemap data is provided. It is automatically synchronized to the current navigation page. Users will also appreciate the sleek interface, ISO-compliance modal input and intuitive keyboard navigation.This sample demonstrates the UXBreadcrumb’s dynamic sitemap reading capability by populating the navigation nodes from external XML file. This control full supports both mouse and keyboard for navigating and editing. Try to use keyboard arrows to navigate between items and press F2 to enter editing mode where you can directly type in the target URL. Alternatively, you also can click the arrow down icon to enter the editing mode.

To find out more samples and experience it for yourself, please visit ClientUI Live Samples.

Feel free to download your copy here. And while waiting for the download, be sure to check out the complete what’s new list here. Existing customers with valid subscription can obtain the latest WebUI Studio from Developer Network, under My Components shortcut.

Any comments or feedbacks are welcome. If you have any questions regarding your account and subscriptions, please feel free to reach me by email.

Thank you and have a nice day.

Cheers,
Martin Lie

Finally, the wait is over! The new WebUI Studio 2012 R2 release is here with tons of new exciting tools and templates that will surely boost up your development productivity. Despite of the slight delay, I trust the new release worth the wait. First off, we don’t just release new controls to add to your toolbox, we also ship a number of new templates to help you quickly getting started with your projects. Furthermore, we’ve added over 175 new technical samples and over 75 new reference samples – all with brand-new look and feel and completely redesigned user experiences. With these inspiring samples, we wanted to help you unleash your big ideas and creativity and take them to the next level.

Alright, before we gone too far, here are some important links that you’ll need for this new release.

• Download WebUI Studio 2012 R2
• What’s New in 2012 R2
• ASP.NET Live Samples
• ClientUI Live Samples

All-new, Completely Redesigned Live Samples.

In addition to many new controls we shipped in this release, we’re pleased to announce the all-new ClientUI live samples with completely redesigned user interface. It’s now featuring larger screen real estate, clean and modern design that allows one to focus better on content, and more intuitive navigation. And for the first time since its first debut 4 years ago, all controls now perform 70% faster than before – thanks to the continuous performance tuning and memory usage optimization.

More importantly, the new live samples puts some of the new R2 controls in action, so you can see how they can be leveraged in your own apps. I’m particularly referring to the new breadcrumb navigation control which completely redefines the overall navigation experiences. Combining hybrid address bar and menu functionality into an elegant user interface, you can now perform navigation in a simple “point-and-click” manner. Let’s take a look at the overview of the redesigned live samples below.

And because we loved this intuitive navigation control so much, we decided to release it as a standalone reusable control to our valued customers. Feel free to unleash your big ideas and make it work your own way. Desktop application developers may rejoice! The navigation control is also available in WPF version, so you can be the first to build Windows 8 Explorer style business applications! We also shipped a WPF project template that leverages this versatile navigation control. More on that later.

In addition to the intuitive navigation, you can notice a whole new user experience that our designer team have put into this new live samples, for instances, it sports the improved CoverFlow with realistic depth shadow, better coverage on What’s New and Featured section – thanks to the fluid design allowing you to see more items in larger screen and adapts to reduced items in smaller screen.

And now to the core part, the entire sample canvas has been revamped as well. Unnecessary toolbars and buttons are gone, fancy gradients are wiped out, options and other navigation elements are centralized to a collapsible pane. Embracing on the modern design, it’s now possible for us to create beautiful, full-screen user experience. See the following screenshot for details.

Enough said, visit the new ClientUI live samples now and experience it for yourself.

In this blog post, I only scratched the surface of the new exciting stuff that we delivered in this release. We’re fully passionate about design and user experiences that balance very well with functionality – and we carefully put that into the engineering process. That said, you can find that all our controls are engineered with thoughtful user experiences, in addition to the rich features and functionalities of course – that’s what sets us apart from other products in the market.

Last but not least, enjoy WebUI Studio 2012 R2! Hopefully this release comes just in time, so you can play around it now and make some planning for your big ideas in the next year. Again, here’s the link to download in case you haven’t done so, and make sure you check out the complete what’s new list here.

All the best,
Jimmy

Continuing my blog series on our upcoming release, I’m pleased to share the final part of WebDesktop’s development for HTML5 and CSS3. In my previous posts, I’ve shared the development progress of converting WebDesktopManager controls into HTML5. You can check the previous posts here: Part 1 and Part 2. In this final part of my post, I’m going to cover the new features for the rest of WebDesktop controls such as WebDesktopManager, WebDialogBox, WebPaneManager, WebSplitter, WebNotification and many others.

In version 4, WebDesktop has been refined to fully support the latest web standards. This allows you to use many of the advanced WebDesktop features in your next-generation web applications and at the same time leveraging cutting-edge technologies such as HTML5 and CSS3. With our latest innovation of “Windows 8 ready” Component Designer, you can easily configure every properties and styles using the latest Visual Studio 2012.

WebNavPane

WebNavPane is one of the many UI controls demanded by application developers. Unfortunately, the existing WebNavPane was designed for HTML4 which mainly uses table for layouting. The first time when we convert WebNavPane to HTML5, we encountered issues with the layout such as shown below:

As you can see, WebNavPane’s border doesn’t get rendered properly and the container becomes smaller. After improving the control to support HTML5, the layout and rendering now shows a perfect results, such as shown below:

Furthermore, we’ve also added a metro style in the latest WebNavPane. This control has been redesigned and developed to fully inherit the styles in Windows 8. And of course, we’re ready to give the best UI in styles and performance in the latest Windows 8.

WebCallOut

Previously, we’ve discussed about the layout issues occurring in WebCallOut when it is set to HTML5 in the beginning. The rendering is completely messed up and the pointer is also offset from the correct position. After numerous improvements made, we’re happy to introduce metro styling in the latest WebCallOut. The metro styles consist of Metro Orange, Metro Silver and metro Simple such as shown below:

WebExplorerPane

We’ve extremely improved WebExplorerPane from its layout. Rendering its layout in HTML5 is much more complex than HTML4. However, we’ve managed to overcome these obstacles and proudly introduced the new metro style in the latest WebExplorerPane.

It perfectly renders and matches the “Windows 8-ready” styling starting from its layout, font color and style and many others.

WebDesktopManager

As we’ve discussed in previous Part 2, there are numerous enhancements in the window and desktop rendering. Since the new specification in HTML5 introduces a number of limitations of TABLE usage, therefore we’ve decided to remove all TABLE usage and use DIV instead.

WebDesktop 4 has added 3 new features to give users freedom in perform styling over WebDesktopManager. Now, the icon in Taskbar is no longer depending on window or shortcut. They can be determined by defining the TaskBarImage property in WebDesktopWindow or WebDesktopShortcut.

You can perform styling to container when using complex image border type. In the previous version, the container’s style will not be assigned in the container itself when using complex image. Starting from WebDesktop 4, you can easily perform styling by setting the ApplyContainerStyle property to true.

WebDialogBox

The changes made in WebDialogBox is almost similar to WebDesktopWindow. By inheriting WebDesktopWindow’s structure, WebDialogBox is rendered using DIV instead of TABLE. With HTML5, the rendering of each browser will be more consistent and more solid than HTML4. WebDialogBox also supports CSS3 for its styling.

Introducing Metro theme for WebDesktop

Since the invention of “Metro” design language, Microsoft has been redesigning all its software products toward the modern UI design, including the recently released Microsoft Windows 8. As a leading tool vendor, we’re pleased to be the among the first to support Metro design language.

That said, our designer team has designed a comprehensive Metro theme that can be easily applied to all existing WebDesktop controls such as WebDesktopManager, WebDialogBox, WebTab and so on. Each control theme is thoughtfully designed to get the right look and feel particularly when it comes to contrast colors. See the screenshot below.

The following screenshots show the Metro theme running on WebDesktop 4. Remember, these are real web applications built on ASP.NET, and run on your favorite browsers.

The new WebDesktop 4 will be available in the upcoming R2 release which is going to be shipped anytime soon in this December 2012. Be sure to stay updated with the next announcement.

Cheers,
Handy

It’s really been a busy month for everyone in the DevDiv at Intersoft as we’re heading toward R2 release. As we haven’t post any new updates recently, you might have been wondering what we’re up to. Thankfully, you’ve just tuned in at the right time because I have some very exciting updates to share in this blog post.

For a decade, we’ve been doing what we do best – creating user interface components that are beautiful inside and out where amazing user experiences meet powerful functionality. And today, we’ve made some of the world’s best tools that help developers build amazing applications ahead of time. But we don’t stop here. In the upcoming release, you’ll find a handful of new exciting tools that do what it does best, so you can stay focused on your business requirements and things that matter the most to you.

The upcoming R2 release is an exceptionally important milestone for us and our valued customers. After nearly a year of intensive development iterations, we’re pleased to say that we’ve recently reaching the stable sprints and will deliver two of the most wanted products in this release.

For the first time ever, say hello to Intersoft’s own charting data visualization suite which will target a broad range of platforms. And business developers may rejoice! A full-fledged XAML reporting engine is coming your way which includes a powerful C# style scripting support for the most demanding business reports. Read on.

Gorgeous charts. Uncompromised performance.

Written from the ground up, Intersoft Charting delivers everything you need to create beautiful charts for your business apps, plus dozens of innovative features not available elsewhere.

We started off our engineering by creating  an advanced canvas that provides reliable support for interactivity features such as zooming, panning, and box selection. We took the zooming capability to the next level by supporting horizontal, vertical, or both directions. And together with smooth panning, resizing with aspect ratio locking and region zoom, Intersoft Charting is built for touch-first user experiences in mind.

Furthermore, Intersoft Charting employs the most advanced rendering technique that puts data points and lines in the most accurate device pixel in your screen. This translates to crystal clear results, and no more blurry lines!

Designed by Intersoft’s own artists, the brand new charting will offer four predefined color schemes and styles that you can choose with a simple property set. Whether you prefer vivid colors, natural colors, or Metro colors, there’s a palette for that. Or if you prefer to use your own palettes, feel free to define as many custom palettes as you like and reuse them throughout the chart instances.

With numerous great features such as smart axis intervals, MVVM support for series binding, linked charts, and over 20+ stunning chart types; we’re confident that Intersoft Charting will deliver an ultimate, enterprise-grade data visualization solution for all your application development needs. More details on Charting will be posted in a separate post by our engineers.

Build Complex Query Visually

Business users have been long asking for the flexibility to edit queries/filters at runtime, but very few provide such functionality in the market. One of the reasons is the design challenges that require extensive research on the user experiences to make it work beautifully. I’m excited to introduce our newest data-aware control lineups: UXQueryBuilder.

Query Builder is an advanced data filtering control that allows users to visually build complex queries/filters. Take a look at the Query Builder’s control design below.

It’s designed in such a way that allows users to interact with complex nested conditions through an intuitive, modern user interface. When a nested filter is added, the control automatically creates a visual branch. It’s also packed with numerous built-in subtle animations to deliver smooth user experiences, such as when a condition is added or removed, and when a single condition is converted to a composite condition.

More importantly, the Query Builder works seamlessly with all ClientUI data controls that are built upon QueryDescriptor framework. This means that you can connect the Query Builder to a Grid View in a simple property set. And you’ll find that things just work – adding a new filter condition and see the Grid’s data will be filtered accordingly.

One of the engineering excellences we put on this control is the capability to support Entity Framework’s navigation properties out of the box – you gotta love this feature! So whenever the Query Builder finds navigation properties in your object, it will list them to the available properties which users can use as the filter condition without extra efforts at developer’s end. Of course, you can exclude certain navigation properties if desired.

And in most cases, your data model might include master-detail relations, think of Product  table that has CategoryID field. It won’t make sense for users to remember the ID to be able to filter a category – I trust you’ll agree with me on that! Thankfully, we built a feature that lets you pre-populate the master data when the control requires it. We make it as simple as possible so that you only have to define an attribute to your model and specify the class that will handle the data retrieval, either synchronously or asynchronously.

Modern UI Themes and Design Templates

All the buzzes and hypes are on Windows 8 as Microsoft launched its latest operating system last week. Although the new UI looks cool and modern at a glance, it could be very challenging in the design process. Without thoughtful design, you may eventually end up with too-plain, boring colorful boxes. I’ve started to find such apps in the Windows Store which exhibits lower apps quality and leads to poor user experiences.

The good news is that we’ll be coming up with very exciting and fresh design themes that comply with the Windows 8 Modern UI. We decided to include the new themes in this upcoming release, thanks to your vote up. Every control is redesigned meticulously – pixel by pixel, color by color, and shape by shape – to create look and feel that are fresh and modern. The result is a balanced combination of design that embraces modern lines but still look great on eyes.

But we don’t just create themes, we took it to a whole new level where the entire design is connected to a set of accent colors that you can personalize, thanks to the brand-new theme manager. We designed the templates from the bottom up in order to achieve a kind of design that looks great in both light and dark theme, on the top of the customizable color theme. Every design aspects, from the font family, size, vector-based icons and colors are all thoughtfully connected to achieve such beautiful results.

It’s such an excellent engineering process that combines great architecture and beautiful design that makes it possible for the theme color to change instantly without performance degradation no matter how complex your content is. There are no visual tree tracing, no dependencies on certain structures or classes, and definitely no heavy-lifting such as scanning all the controls within the page.

And the best of all, our design team will come up with a few stunning project templates that you can use instantly to create your next-generation, modern-style business apps in both Silverlight and WPF platforms.

And more…

In this blog post, I’ve only scratched the surface of what we’ll come up with in the upcoming release. There are much more new exciting lineups that I couldn’t cover in this single post. In conclusion, this release will be a very important milestone for us and our customers, particularly as we’re entering two huge market segments at once.

Finally, I hope you liked what you see so far. And if you’ve got questions or feedback, make sure you write them down in the comment box below. Thanks for reading, and stay tuned for my next post!

All the best,
Jimmy

In this opportunity, I’d like to announce our special double promo in this month. If you purchase any of WebUI Studio subscription license, you will be given a direct 20% discount. Then, you will have a privilege to enter our Wheel of Fortune page to claim your prize. For more information about this lucky promo, see the following link:
http://intersoftpt.com/Corporate/News.aspx?page=News&EventId=211

The promo will be effective from 10th October 2012 until 30th November 2012. Don’t miss out this special promo! Grab your WebUI Studio subscription license today through our online store.

Please contact me immediately at martin@intersoftpt.com to join this limited offer.

Thank you and look forward to seeing you in our Wheel of Fortune promo.

Regards,
Martin