What's New in ComponentOne 2020 v3

The ComponentOne 2020 v3 release is here! Our development team has been hard at work, bringing our .NET UI controls to the next level. This release is packed with many significant changes, including the official release of our .NET 5 controls for WinForms & WPF, new data source connectors, new Blazor UI controls, and FlexGrid improvements on every platform. You'll also be able to experience all of our demos in a new way with an improved C1DemoExplorer.

ComponentOne is .NET 5 Ready

The future of .NET is here, and ComponentOne is ready with new, yet familiar, .NET 5 controls for desktop development. Following .NET Core 3.1, .NET 5 is the next version that unifies the .NET Framework with other .NET development across the web, cloud, mobile, and gaming by providing a single SDK and runtime that can be used everywhere. With .NET 5, developers also get performance enhancements, single-file applications, Web and cloud improvements, and much more. The .NET 5 release includes new versions of our most popular WinForms and WPF controls built on .NET 5 for optimal performance and features. Read more about ComponentOne .NET 5 controls here.

When it comes to UI controls for WinForms and WPF, ComponentOne has you covered for the past, present, and future, with our continued support for .NET Framework 4.5.2, current support for .NET 5, and future commitment to .NET 6 in 2021.

What's New in WinForms 2020 v3

.NET 5 Support in WinForms

The following .NET 5 controls are now production ready: FlexGrid, FlexChart, Ribbon, InputPanel, ExpressionEditor, RulesManager, SuperTooltip, Themes, Sparklines, DataCollection, Icon, and DataEngine. In addition to the above controls, we are releasing the following controls as beta: TextBox, NumericEdit, Button, ComboBox, Label, MaskedTextBox, FlexReport, FlexViewer, TreeView, Maps, Document, BarCode, Bitmap, and Command. These controls will be production-ready by the 2021 v1 release.

If you need any controls not available in .NET 5 yet - you can also continue to work with .NET 4.5.2 controls in .NET 5 apps. The known issues include incomplete designer support, the property grid can't set some select type properties, and OleDB data sources are not supported out-of-the-box in .NET 5. Read more in our .NET 5 release blog.

The ComponentOne .NET 5 controls use our new licensing system rolled out during 2020 v2. If you have an active subscription, you may need to get a new key from our sales & support team to license these controls.

FlexGrid for WinForms Enhancements

The .NET 5 version of FlexGrid has added missing features from the preview like GroupPanel, import, and export to Excel and CSV.

For .NET 4.5.2, FlexGrid is enhanced with an optional context menu on the column headers to sort, hide, and auto-size columns.

Ribbon for WinForms Enhancements

C1Ribbon icons have high DPI support thanks to C1Icon. It also has improved support for selecting dark or light icons from presets for Backstage and AppMenu buttons.

Additionally, the RibbonControlHost component now supports simplified mode, and we've replaced the old C1Ribbon with the new one in other controls and applications like FlexViewer and ThemeDesigner. Learn more about our new superior C1Ribbon and how to migrate from the old version.

Other WinForms Enhancements

• RulesManager for WinForms now has tooltip support and a rich tooltip API to customize the tooltips. Use the new ShowToolTips property and the BeforeTooltipShow event to customize the tooltips.
• TreeView for WinForms has been improved with a new AddRange method that adds a collection of nodes, new AutoCheckChildNodes property to check all items when the header is checked, and design-time editor enhancements.

What's New in WPF for 2020 v3

.NET 5 Support in WPF

The following .NET 5 controls are now production ready: FlexGrid, FlexChart, FlexPie, Input, DateTime Editors, ColorPicker, ComboBox, DropDown, Docking, RichTextBox, TabControl, TreeView, FlexPivot, DataFilter, FilterEditor, Expander, Maps, Ribbon, FinancialChart, TabControl, and RichTextBoxToolstrip (simplified toolbar). The controls also have new default styles compared to the .NET 4.5.2 version. The new default style is more fluent-like, with minimal lines and light colors.

If you need any controls not available in .NET 5 yet - you can also continue to work with .NET 4.5.2 controls in .NET 5 apps. The known issues include incomplete designer support, and OleDB data sources are not supported out-of-the-box in .NET 5. Read more in our .NET 5 release blog.

New Pivot Grid for WPF .NET 5

The 2020 v3 release introduces our new FlexPivot for WPF .NET 5. Renamed and re-engineered from our older C1Olap controls, FlexPivot is a UI library of pivot tables, charts, and pivot panels that replicate the Microsoft Excel pivot table experience. With FlexPivot, you can process and aggregate millions of rows of data in milliseconds and pull multiple data sources into a single, multi-dimensional pivot table from online or local OLAP cubes. Like its predecessor, FlexPivot also extends FlexGrid, the industry's best and most flexible .NET data grid. Internally, this control now uses our newest charting library, FlexChart, and data engine for improved performance.

ComponentOne FlexPivot is an enterprise control available with a Studio Enterprise subscription.

New Material Themes for WPF

In addition to .NET 5 support, ComponentOne WPF Edition adds a new material theme in this release. Inspired by the popular Google theme, Material themes are minimal and utilize empty space to visualize data more cleanly. Material themes are ideal for a modern look or touch-based UIs. The light and dark material themes are supported in .NET Framework 4.5.2.

FlexGrid for WPF Column Selection

FlexGrid for WPF has been updated to support two new selection modes: Column and ColumnRange. This allows developers to restrict selection to a single or range of entire columns for unique scenarios.

DataConnectors Expand with QuickBooks Online & Google Analytics Integration

Integrate your business data from popular online CRMs like Salesforce and Microsoft Dynamics into your .NET apps with ease. Our .NET DataConnectors library continues to grow this release with added QuickBooks Online and Google Analytics integration. The DataConnectors are based on .NET Standard 2.1, so they can be used anywhere - WinForms, WPF, .NET 5, Blazor, ASP. NET Core.

With ComponentOne DataConnectors, you can import and analyze data from different data sources using a standard interface while displaying data or generating reports from these popular Cloud services. Read more about the key features of DataConnectors.

What's New in Blazor for 2020 v3

Blazor Inputs for Dates, Times, and Numbers

Display, edit, and validate numeric, date, and time information using DateTime Editors and NumericBox for Blazor. Get four specialized Blazor input controls: C1NumericBox, C1DateTimePicker, C1DatePicker, and C1TimeEditor. Select values from a wide range of supported date and time formats and cultures. Customize the icons and display buttons.

Blazor Calendar

Display multiple, adjacent months in a single calendar view. The new Blazor Calendar control supports data binding, selection events, customizable styles, and navigation elements. Quickly pick dates with built-in support for month and year views and switch among these views to quickly navigate to any date.

Blazor Charts

Our new Blazor chart control, FlexChart, gets many enhancements this release, including:

• New chart types: treemap, sunburst, polar, and radar
• Interaction improvements: tooltips, selection, and legend toggling.
• Analytic chart types: trendlines, error bars, box and whisker, waterfall series, histogram, and ranged histogram
• Support for multiple axes and plot areas
• Support for automatic label positioning and dashed line styles

What's New in ASP. NET MVC for 2020 v3

Organize Lists and Content with Accordion UI

Display a list of expandable items with the new Accordion for ASP. NET MVC control. The MVC Accordion control helps organize your UI and optimize the use of screen real estate, and it's optimized with responsive rendering and animation.

Generate Barcode Images Supporting 26 Encoding Types

Generate or retrieve barcodes on the server and render them entirely on the client with the new Barcode for ASP. NET Core MVC. The barcode control supports 26 different types of encodings, from QR codes to UPC barcodes.

MultiRow Enhanced with Transposed View

MultiRow for ASP. NET MVC now supports a transposed view, which is another way to show tabular data and is especially useful when there are few data items. The transposed multi-row aspect repeats the records horizontally instead of vertically like in a traditional grid.

FlexGrid Enhanced with Custom Editors

FlexGrid has in-built support for Excel-like, fast editing. However, in some instances, users may need advanced editing. Now you can specify a custom editor control for a column by setting the "Editor" property. You can use any input control you want, including DatePicker, Numeric Textbox, AutoComplete, ColorPicker, and more.

FlexChart Enhanced with Fast WebGL Rendering Options

With WebGL rendering, you can load extensive data sets, up to hundreds of thousands of data points, without sacrificing performance. Check out a live demo.

Other ASP. NET MVC Enhancements

• Case-Sensitive Search - FlexGrid, ComboBox, and ListBox now support case-sensitive search.
• Security Features in PDF Export - PDF protection features: setting the user password and owner password and permissions added for annotating, accessibility, copying, document assembly, filling forms, modifying, and printing.

New Look for C1DemoExplorer

You can now access and experience all of our demos from one convenient desktop application. The new and improved C1DemoExplorer app includes the new .NET 5 desktop demos and links to our online demos.

Download the new C1DemoExplorer here.

Reminder: Important Updates to Licensing

Please look back at our previous release notes for essential changes we introduced to licensing in the last release if you missed it. The ComponentOne .NET 5 controls use our new licensing system rolled out during 2020 v2. If you have an active subscription, you may need to get a new key from our sales & support team to license these controls.