Released: May 17, 2018

Updates in 18.1

Features

• Chart Control
  • Custom Units of Measurement. Custom Aggregate Functions - You can now aggregate data by a custom unit of measurement (e.g. 15 minutes, 4 hours, etc.) You can also define a custom function that aggregates values using custom rules without modifying the source collection.
  • Custom Colors for Automatically Generated Series - The Chart Control can now provide custom colors to auto-generated series using one of the following colorizers:
    • Key-Color Colorizer assigns colors from a palette to series by series data member values.
    • Data Source Colorizer binds colors that the extra data source stores to a series via series data member values.
  • Crosshair Cursor Enhancements - This release extends the capabilities of the Crosshair Cursor. New features include:
    • Display values of series points that are selected by the Crosshair Cursor in a legend
    • Crosshair Cursor Lines (argument and value) follow the mouse cursor simultaneously
    • The ability to display the Crosshair Cursor in the exported/printed chart
    • The ability to display any data source field value within the Crosshair Cursor's Label.
  • DirectX Rendering (2D Charts) - 2D WinForms Charts now support DirectX rendering.
  • Multi-Select Enhancements - You can select multiple items by drawing a rectangular region with the CTRL key pressed.
  • Data Grid Control
  • Infinite Scrolling - The WinForms Grid ships with an 'Infinite Scrolling' mode - allowing you to more efficiently display data from very large data sources.
  • Binding Selection to Data Source - In multiple row selection mode, you can sync row selected states with a Boolean field in the bound data source. The selection binding mode ensures that row selection persists whenever you filter or group grid data.
• Data Editors
  • Calendar - ClassicNew View - The DevExpress WinForms Calendar Control and Date Edit ship with a ClassicNew view (inspired by Outlook 2016).
  • Open File, Save File and Folder Browser Dialogs - The DevExpress WinForms Open File, Save File and Folder Browser Dialogs were first released as a community technology preview in v17.2. This update marks their official release. New enhancements include:
    • The Folder Browser Dialog includes Compact and Wide display modes.
    • Ability to select legacy or skinable dialogs when using the Open File/Folder Behaviors and MVVM services.
  • PictureEdit - DirectX Support - The WinForms PictureEdit control now supports DirectX rendering.
  • Toast Notification Manager Enhancements - With this release, the DevExpress WinForms ToastNotificationManager gives you the ability to create Windows 10-inspired toast notifications.
  • Splash Screens - Overlay Wait Form - v18.1 introduces an Overlay Wait form. The Overlay Form is a semi-transparent splash screen that runs in a background thread and prevents access to a control or form by displaying an overlay.
  • Group Control - New Group Styles - New rendering styles: Light, Title and Card.
  • Color Pick Editors - Magnifier Dialog enhancements - The Magnifier Dialogs have been updated with the following enhancements:
    • When zooming, the Magnifier Dialog displays a pixel grid allowing you to distinguish individual pixels easily.
    • Avoid pixel hunting by switching to precise cursor positioning (press CTRL).
  • ListBox - Highlight Search Results - The WinForms ListBox control now highlights strings that match the search text.
  • High DPI Support - Enhanced High DPI Drawing for all Windows Forms Controls - This release enhances DirectX rendering support, and improves the scaling of control elements, borders, indents and images across the WinForms product line.
  • Image to DPIAware Image Conversion - Added a new action to the ImageCollection's smart tag, which converts the ImageCollection to DPIAwareImageCollection.
  • SVG Icons in New Controls - Now uses SVG icons by default in the following controls: Scheduler, Filter Editor, LayoutView and PDF Viewer.
  • Map Control
  • Circular Scrolling - The DevExpress WinForms Map Control allows you to scroll image and vector maps "circularly."
  • Runtime Vector Item Editor -  With this release, you can edit vector items at runtime.
• Navigation UI
  • Pager Navigation - The Radio Group and Windows UI Button Panel can be used as a pager for the following: Tile Control, Tile Bar, Navigation Frame and Image Slider.
  • Tile Control - DirectX Hardware Acceleration - The DevExpress WinForms Tile Control now supports DirectX rendering so you can create high performance solutions for use on High DPI devices.
  • Fluent Design Form - This release includes the new Fluent Design Form. Inspired by the brand new Microsoft Fluent Design System, its features include:
    • Integrated Hamburger Menu
    • Adaptive Layout
    • Acrylic Material (a partially transparent texture)
    • Reveal Highlight
  • Hamburger Menu - Integrated the Hamburger Menu with the Accordion Control: Set the ViewType property to HamburgerMenu and the Accordion Control will support a collapsed state designed to mimic the behavior of Windows 10 apps (displays a narrow strip of icons when collapsed).
  • Accordion Control - Navigation Pane layout - The WinForms Accordion Control supports a new Navigation Pane option - one that mimics the latest styles used by Microsoft UWP applications. To enable it, set the EnablePaneFooter property to true.
• PDF Viewer
  • DirectX Rendering (Beta) - With this release, both the PDF Viewer for WinForms and PDF Document API support DirectX rendering.
• Pivot Grid Control
  • Performance Enhancements - Improved the Pivot Grid's in-memory data processing. The following features are now processed by the pivot grid in Optimized Mode:
    • Drill-Down
    • Unbound Expressions
  • Print Row Headings on Every Page - You can now set a new option and print row headings on every page.
  • Excel Inspired Filter - Improved the Pivot Grid's Filter Popup. End-users can now filter grouped data using Excel inspired filter.
• Ribbon, Bars and Dock UI
  • Dock Windows - Light View - This release includes a new "Light" mode. When used, all Dock Windows are drawn using 1-pixel borders.
  • Design-Time Enhancements
  • WinForms Bar Manager - The designer's 'Toolbars' page allows you to manage toolbars, create different bar item types, add bar items to toolbars and populate hierarchical sub-menus. The Customization Form is now resizable, and provides on-form actions to manipulate bar items and categories.
  • WinForms Ribbon - The designer's 'Ribbon Items' page allows you to customize ribbon item hierarchy (categories, pages, page groups, buttons and sub-menus).
  • WinForms Popup Menus-  A new editor integrated into the Bar Manager/Ribbon Designer allows you to customize popup menus. The menu editor allows you to create a popup menu, populate the menu with items, and modify menu/item settings.
  • Ribbon Memory Usage and Performance Enhancements
• Rich Text Editor
  • Microsoft Word Inspired Formatting and Layout - Enhanced layout and formatting accuracy when displaying, printing and exporting documents. DPI settings are also no longer an issue.
  • Checkbox Form Fields - With this release, our WinForms and WPF Rich Text Editors can load documents with checkboxes. End-users can toggle checkbox state, save, print or export the result.
  • Automatic Document Format Identification - With this release, if a document is loaded from a file or stream programmatically, the DevExpress RichEditControl automatically identifies the document's format based on its content.
  • Print API - The WinForms RichEditControl now includes the 'Print' method that allows you to print documents using default or custom printer settings.
• Scheduler Control
  • New Storage Mechanism - Replaced the existing SchedulerStorage with SchedulerDataStorage. Its features include:
    • Labels and statuses can have their own data sources out-of-the-box.
    • Storage data isn't reloaded after each change in the underlying data source.
    • Previously, any data change fired the same 'CollectionLoaded' event, and it was impossible to identify what kind of operation was performed. The new storage provides various events for different action types.
    • Enclosing data operations with the BeginUpdate\EndUpdate methods is no longer required.
    • The new storage correctly recognizes any data modifications performed at the data source level.
  • SVG Icons - With this release, the DevExpress WinForms Scheduler uses SVG icons by default. To revert to previous behavior and use raster graphics instead, disable the 'WindowsFormSettings.AllowDefaultSvgImages' option.
  • DirectX Rendering - The DevExpress WinForms Scheduler Control now supports DirectX rendering so you can create high performance solutions for use on High DPI devices.
• Skins and Vector Icons
  • New Skin Selector - With the release of the Bezier vector-based skin, a traditional skin gallery may “feel” overcrowded. The new skin/swatch selector is designed to address this issue and provide users a more intuitive way to apply the desired appearance to their application.
  • Office Palettes for Vector Skins - v18.1 adds four vector skin palettes inspired by MS Office.
  • SVG Icon Builder in MS Windows Store - The DevExpress SVG Icon Builder is a productivity tool designed to simplify the creation of custom SVG icons by combining existing graphical elements. You can install it directly from the Microsoft Windows Store.
• Spreadsheet Control
  • Spreadsheet Shapes - From simple lines and rectangles, to banners and callouts, the WinForms and WPF Spreadsheet controls now support all shape types. You can move, resize and remove shapes. Worksheets with shapes can also be printed and exported to PDF.
  • Custom Colors for Individual Chart Series Points - With this release, our WinForms and WPF Spreadsheet controls can display, print and export worksheets with charts that contain series points with custom colors.
  • Formula AutoComplete - With this release, we've simplified formula construction. Our WinForms and WPF Spreadsheet controls now support Formula AutoComplete. This feature can help prevent spelling or syntax errors by providing a list of function names, defined names and table names that match the characters you enter into a formula.
  • Miscellaneous Enhancements
    • Automatic Document Format Identification: With this release, if a document is loaded from a file without specifying its format, the Spreadsheet control automatically identifies the document's format based on its content (regardless of filename extension).
    • A new 'Print' method allows you to print an entire document or an individual sheet using default or custom printer settings.
• TreeList Control
  • Excel-Inspired Group Filter - Excel-inspired filter dropdowns can now group filter items from two or more columns, and present the result as a hierarchical checked list. For instance, instead of a linear task list, you can show tasks grouped by employees:
  • DirectX Hardware Acceleration - Enable the 'WindowsFormsSettings.ForceDirectXPaint' option and leverage the power of DirectX hardware acceleration to boost TreeList rendering on High DPI devices.
  • Display Node Images within Data Cells - By default, our WinForms TreeList control reserves space for both Select and State images if either are displayed within a node. With this new option, you can save space by moving Select/State images from the indent region to node cells.
  • Band and Column Separators - You can now highlight individual columns and bands by changing the width and appearance settings of their separators.
  • Tree Line Visibility - By default, tree lines are displayed or hidden based upon the currently applied skin. v18.1 introduces the new 'ShowTreeLines' option allowing you to explicitly specify whether to display tree lines. If this option is enabled, you can specify node hierarchy line styles using the TreeLineStyle property.
  • Miscellaneous Enhancements - Added a few popular Data Grid API members (RowClick, RowCellClick, MakeColumnVisible, etc.) to the TreeList control and added expand/collapse node animation effects.
• Vertical Grid Control
  • Office 2016 Inspired View - The WinForms Property Grid ships with a new "flat" view inspired by Office 2016. Its features include:
    • Ability to organize categories into separate groups
    • Advanced value editing for numeric properties
  • Design-Time Access to all DevExpress Project Settings - When you start a new project, you can right-click the Visual Studio Solution Explorer and select DevExpress Project Settings to activate a page that exposes major DevExpress project settings.
  • Filter Editor Enhancements - New enhancements include:
    • Tabbed UI
    • Syntax Highlighting
    • Auto-Complete
    • Expression Validation and Error Indication
• Template Gallery - Logify Client Template (Windows Forms, WPF and ASP.NET) - Logify is a 24/7 application monitoring tool (helps you track errors and log app crash events). The DevExpress WinForms Team has extended the Template Gallery with a new template designed to add a Logify client to your project with one click.
• Adorner UI Manager - Tab Badges - The DevExpress WinForms Adorner UI Manager can now display tab badges.
• MVVM: DialogService UICommands - The DevExpress MVVM DialogService can now display dialog windows with custom buttons.