MindFusion Pack for Silverlight 2013.R1

MindFusion has released a new version of its Silverlight controls suite. There are new features in many of the controls, here are details:

Visual Studio 2012 Support

New assemblies for all components targeting Silverlight 5 are available. Additionally all samples provide versions for Visual Studio 2012.

chartMindFusion.Charting

Radar and Polar charts
The Silverlight charting control adds a brand new types of charts – radar and polar charts. They support unlimited number of data series, 4 label types at the inner and outer axes, spiderweb, scatters and many more.

Radar chart

Radar chart

Hit testing
The new HitTest method returns a list of all ChartElement objects, which contain the specified point. Each chart type has its own ChartElement-derived class, which exposes properties for the hit object – data, labels, value etc.

Visual Effects
All chart types support the System.Windows.Media.Effects.DropShadowEffect and System.Windows.Media.Effects.Blur effect. Use the Effect property to specify the chosen effect.

diagram16x16MindFusion.Diagramming

Node Effects
You can apply to nodes two visual effects, represented by the GlassEffect and AeroEffect classes. Effects can be added, removed or modified at any time and this will immediately reflect on the diagram. Effects of different types can be applied simultaneously.

Themes and Theme Editor
A theme in DiagramLite is a set of styles, each associated with a specific item type. When the theme is applied to a diagram, the styles registered in the theme affect all objects of their associated type. Styles are associated with item types within the theme through the RegisterStyle method. The package also includes a Theme Editor tool that provides simple visual environment for theme creation and modification. There are also several predefined themes available in the Themes subfolder of the installation root folder.

Diagram documents and tabbed views
The DiagramDocument class represents a collection of diagram pages or sheets, represented by DiagramPage objects. New pages can be added to the document and existing pages can be removed and reordered via the Pages collection.

The new TabbedDiagramView can be used to display DiagramDocument objects. The view displays a tab for each page in the document. You can change the active page, add and remove pages as well rearrange them by dragging with the mouse.

One-way graph Layout
The OneWayLayout class ensures that links enter into nodes from the same general direction and exit them from the opposite side. If the graph contains cycles, some links bend around the nodes to keep the enter/exit direction consistent. The algorithm aims to minimize the number of such links.

One Way Graph Layout

One Way Graph Layout

Multiple labels per link
The LinkLabel class allows multiple captions to be displayed for a single DiagramLink object. Link labels provide a set of properties allowing full customization of their display and positioning. The labels support automatic arrangement.

Layers
Items can now be assigned to layers, and layers can be hidden, locked or moved up/down in the Z order as a group. Set the LayerIndex property of items to associate them with layers in the Diagram.Layers collection. The Layer objects provide Visible, Locked and ZIndex properties, which affect all items in the respective layer. Layers also expose a Title property shown in the LayerListView control.

Layer list control
The LayerListView control provides user interface for working with Layer objects. The control displays a list of all layers in a specified Diagram with a title and an overview area, and also allows editing of layer’s Title, Visible and Locked properties and choosing the Diagram’s currently active layer.

Magnifier
The new magnifier tool lets you interactively zoom in (or out) portions of the diagram by holding down a modifier key or pressing a mouse button. The magnifier’s zoom factor and size are
customizable.

The Magnifier Tool

The Magnifier Tool

Report-16x16MindFusion.Reporting

Side-By-Side Containers
You can arrange items in the report parallelly by putting them inside the new SideBySideContainer report item. One of the uses is to display two (or more) data ranges next to each other.

Miscellaneous

  • New DefaultEncoding property in PdfExporter;
  • New Median aggregate function;
A sample report

A sample report

Calendar-16x16MindFusion.Scheduling

Improved item presenter
The ItemPresenter class now provides the start and end time of the represented item fragment through the new StartTime and EndTime properties. In addition, derived classes can override the new OnStartTimeChanged, OnEndTimeChanged, and OnItemPropertyChanged methods to get notified when the StartTime or EndTime properties change or when any property of the underlying item changes.

Improved recurrence
The Recurrennce class exposes a new event – ValidateOccurrence, which can be used to validate and customize the occurrences of a recurrence pattern.

A sample schedule

A sample schedule

You can read further details about the release at the forum. A trial version is available for download from here:

Download MindFusion Silverlight Pack R1.2013

Technical Support
You are welcomed to post your questions at the forum section of the respective product. You can also use the help desk or the support e-mail. MindFusion puts special effort in providing fast and competent technical support to everyone using our products.

About MindFusion.Silverlight Pack: A set of advanced Silverlight components that help you build your business application easy and on time. The tools provide you with a complete set of features for creating, editing and rendering complex flowcharts, charts, diagrams, calendars, maps, schedules and reports. A set of gauges and UI elements is also included. Each component offers various samples, tutorials and detailed documentation. The controls offer simple and intuitive API, completely customizable appearance, numerous input/output options and a rich event set. Each tool has been thoroughly tested to guarantee that you and your application get the high quality and performance you deserve.

MindFusion Diagram Viewer Library for Android

You can show now your diagrams and flowcharts on any Android device. With MindFusion DiagramViewer library for Android you can load any diagram, created by any MindFusion diagramming component and exported to XML. Currently, the diagram viewer supports the following item types:

  • ShapeNode
  • ContainerNode
  • TableNode
  • TreeViewNode
  • DiagramLink
Diagrams in Android mobile devices

Diagrams in Android mobile devices

The library includes all model classes and properties from MindFusion’s Java diagramming library. This provides your Android applications with access to the loaded links and nodes and their data properties, along with methods for simple hit testing from touch events. Here is a link to the online documentation of the Java diagramming component:

MindFusion.Diagramming for Java online reference.

MindFusion diagram viewer for Android is free of charge for anyone with a license for any MindFusion.Diagramming component – you can learn more about the tools here.

We have prepared a deteiled guide on how to use the library in an Android application. You can read the tutorial from here:

Tutorial: How to Render a Diagram in an Android Application

Diagramming for ASP.NET 5.0

MindFusion has released a new version of its Diagramming for ASP.NET component. There are many new features for customizing the appearance, a new layout and a few enhancements. Here are the details:

Styles & Themes

You can apply now styles to change the appearance of the diagram items. Each style is a set
of properties, which can be applied to a given diagram item (with the DiagramItem.Style
property) or to all items of a specific type (by using a Theme). The theme is a collection of
styles. Each style in the theme sets the appearance of all items of a specific type. Themes
can be loaded from XML files.

The Slate Theme

The Slate Theme

Node effects
(n.a. in Canvas mode)

Two visual effects – the GlassEffect and the AeroEffect can be applied to nodes. Effects can
be added, removed or modified at any time and this reflects immediately on the diagram. You
can apply effects of different types simultaneously.

One way graph layout

This layout ensure that links enter into nodes from the same general direction and exit from
the opposite side. If the graph contains cycles some links bend around the nodes to keep the
enter/exit direction consistent. The algorithm aims to minimize the number of such links.

one_way_layout1

The One Way Graph Layout

Enhancements in Canvas mode

  • Items can cast shadows
  • Items can be Locked
  • Containers are available in Canvas mode
  • Tables are available in Canvas mode
  • Tooltips for items
  • and more

Enhancements in ImageMap mode

  • Items can be Locked
  • Interactive rotation of nodes
  • ImageFormat property added to ShapeListBox
  • and more

Multiple Labels per Link
(n.a. in Canvas mode)
The LinkLabels class allows multiple captions to be displayed for a single DiagramLink instance.
Link labels provide a set of properties that allow full customization of their location and
appearance. Labels support automatic arrangement to avoid overlapping nodes or other
labels.

Layers
(n.a. in Canvas mode)
Items can be assigned to layers and layers can be hidden, locked or moved up/down in the
Z-order or as a group. Use the LayerIndex property to associate and item with a layer in the
Diagram.Layers collection. Each layer has Visible, Locked and ZIndex properties, which affect
all items in the layer.

Parallel Layouts
The .NET 4 version of Diagramming for ASP.NET takes advantage of the Task Parallel Library
to enable parallelism on the different layout algorithms. Set the EnableParallelism property of
the Layout class to true to enable arranging different sub graphs on different threads to
improve performance on multiprocessor systems.

Magnifier
(in Java and Silverlight modes)
The new magnifier tool allows user to interactively zoom in or zoom out portions of the
diagram by holding down a magnifier tree or pressing a mouse button. The magnifier’s
appearance and zoom factor can be customized.

The Magnifier Tool

The Magnifier Tool

API changes
A variety of changes have been made to the API of the control to keep it elegant and simple – please consult the “What’s new section” in the online documentation.

Detailed information about the release is posted at the forum. The trial version is available for direct download from the link below:

Download MindFusion.Diagramming for ASP.NET 5.0

About Diagramming for ASP.NET: An advanced WebForms programming component that offers all the functionality that is needed for creating, styling and presenting attractive flowcharts, hierarchies, trees, graphs, schemes, diagrams and many more. The control offers numerous utility methods, path finding and cycle detection, rich event set and many useful user interaction features like tool tips, multiple selection, copy/paste to/from Windows clipboard and many more.

NetDiagram offers 87 predefined node shapes, scrollable tables, 13 automatic layouts and many more. You can check the online demo to see some of the features in action. The control includes many samples, detailed documentation and step-by-step tutorials. Every features is duly documented and there’s plenty of code to copy. We have done our best to make the component not only powerful and scalable, but easy to learn and fun to use.