FarPoint Forums

VS2010 "Type universe cannot resolve assembly" has nothing to do with relativity

robby — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:50:00 GMT

If you happen to see this error be concerned, but do not be alarmed... :-)

If you find this error message confusing, it is simply due to the fact that you did not read it with the correct understanding of the "Type universe." You see, the Type universe is, evidently, the collection of all the types and assemblies in the deployment framework. In other words, System.Design.dll could not be found in the target framework for the application.

Why does this matter, and what does this mean?

The Microsoft Visual Studio team decided in VS 2010 to change the default Target framework for application to .NET Framework 4 Client Profile. The intent of this change is reasonable- "to improve the deployment size, time, reliability and overall deployment experience for client application users."

Unfortunately, GrapeCity, along with many ISVs, did not become aware of this change in Visual Studio 2010 behavior until too late. Therefore we have not yet had time to adjust Spread for Windows Forms to work to target the Framework-Client Profile.

The above error occurs when dragging Spread for Windows Forms from the Toolbox to a WindowsForm, and results from the Spread assembly containing designtime classes that have dependecies on classes in System.Design.dll. The System.Design assembly is not included in the Client Profile - so there you have it. We have reasons for including the designtime classes in the Spread assembly, but they are not good enough reasons so we have plans to provide full support for the VS2010 default, Client Profile, behavior by separating Spread for Windows Forms 5 design functionality into a separate assembly. However, until a maintenance release is published to address this issue, the work-around in VS2010 is to change the Target framework to a non-Client Profile Framework.

Good coding!

Visual Studio 2010 and Spread for Windows Forms 5

seanl — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:01:00 GMT

GrapeCity, a Visual Studio Industry Partner, proudly announces that FarPoint Spread for Windows Forms 5 has been tested with pre-release versions of Visual Studio 2010, and will be prepared to fully support the new version of Visual Studio when it is officially released in April. In fact, except for the new Client Profile framework targets, which will be supported in the maintenance release scheduled for early April, it is fully supported now with the current releases for .NET 2.0 and .NET 3.5! Both of those versions support creating applications targeting any of the full framework target versions available in Visual Studio 2010. The new version of Spread for Windows Forms includes all the design time editors and designers that developers may already be familiar with using for Spread development in Visual Studio. In addition, Charting functionality has been added to Spread which includes Chart Designer to enhance the Spread development experience in Visual Studio.

GrapeCity, Inc. Releases Spread for Windows Forms version 5

seanl — Fri, 18 Dec 2009 14:46:00 GMT

Have you heard yet? GrapeCity Inc. has now released Spread for Windows Forms version 5!

Special thanks go to Naomi and her testing teams for their hard work creating and verifying the numerous test cases, and to Allan and his development teams for implementing the new version enhancements, and to all the beta testers who contributed on the forums to making this the best, fastest, and most feature-rich release of Spread ever!

You can get detailed product information here, download the trial version here, and purchase it here.

Our support technicians are monitoring the forums and email, so please let us know of any questions or problems you have with installing or using the product.

Sean Lawyer, Product Manager, GrapeCity Inc.

Microsoft PDC

donald — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 15:11:00 GMT

As usual, the Microsoft PDC show in LA was filled with all kinds of great announcements, including ‘Dallas’ http://www.microsoft.com/windowsazure/dallas/

If you didn't get to make it to the show, we posted some pictures that you can view now:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/45053493@N08/sets/72157622886105732/

We also recorded a couple videos:

‘.NET Rocks’ Interview
Robby Powell from GrapeCity talks with Carl Franklin and Richard Campbell of .NET Rocks! on what's new on ActiveReports and Spread .NET developer tools and components.

“Why we chose ActiveReports”
Sanjeev Jagtap of GrapeCity interviews Al Perez of Total Computer Group on why they chose ActiveReports as their .NET reporting platform for their systems that are now on the Microsoft Azure cloud computing platform.

Both videos can be found here - http://www.youtube.com/GrapeCityInc

Donald

Spread for Windows Forms 5 RC Posted

seanl — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 21:21:00 GMT

I am happy to announce that the Spread for Windows Forms version 5 Release Candidate has now been posted!

Download here:

http://www.fpoint.com/SpreadWin5RC/20ver.aspx

http://www.fpoint.com/SpreadWin5RC/35ver.aspx

I plan to monitor your feedback here and in the beta forum, so please let me know if you have any questions or problems.

Download our Slides/Demo Presentation from the VS 2010 Virtual Tech Briefing

donald — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 14:46:00 GMT

If you didn't have time to attend our session entitled "Deliver Complete .NET Business Intelligence Solutions by combining Spreadsheets, Reporting and Data Visualization in Microsoft Visual Studio" that followed the Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Tech Briefing, now is your chance! We've zipped up both the slide desk and the demo video that you can download now:

http://www.FarPointSpread.com/Videos/BISolutions/

Unzip the file to your harddrive then either:
1) Run GrapeCityVS2010.pps to view the slides and video or
2) Run GrapeCityVS2010.wmv to view the video only

As always, please let us know if you have any questions. Enjoy the show!

Join us for the Visual Studio 2010 Beta Tech Briefing - Oct 28th

donald — Fri, 23 Oct 2009 15:33:00 GMT

Join us, along with Microsoft, for the Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 Virtual Tech Briefing, a one-day virtual event showing you what you need to know about this new release – just out in beta.

Following the Microsoft presentation, we will be presenting our session entitled, “Deliver Complete .NET Business Intelligence Solutions by combining Spreadsheets, Reporting and Data Visualization in Microsoft Visual Studio”.

Registration is free! Register now at CodeProject.com - http://www.codeproject.com/webcasts/vs2010Beta/

We’re giving away an HDTV!

donald — Thu, 22 Oct 2009 13:42:00 GMT

If you‘re going to PDC, see if there’s still time to register for the Birds-of-a-Feather sessions. We’re giving away the grand prize of an HDTV!

http://www.pdcbof.com/post/219878530/grapecity-joins-as-a-community-roundtable-sponsor

If you’re there, be sure to stop by our booth and say Hello. We’d love to meet you.

Donald

FarPoint Acquired by GrapeCity

rickwilliamson — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 18:14:00 GMT

Dear Loyal FarPoint Customer,

As many of you may know, FarPoint has been in business since 1991, making us the oldest component business in the US. We would like to thank each and every one of you who have been with us for all or part of those 18 years. We have always strived to deliver the best products possible, put our customers first and make it a positive experience for everyone involved.

October 1st , 2009 is the start of an exciting new era for FarPoint. FarPoint has been acquired by GrapeCity, the largest component vendor in the world. What does this mean to you, a FarPoint customer? Everything. GrapeCity has been reselling FarPoint Spread in Japan since 1994. Spread has been the #1 selling component in Japan every year since it was introduced. GrapeCity has the incentive and the resources to take Spread to a new level and do it on an International stage. With over 800 employees worldwide, the Spread team now has access to invaluable resources we could only dream about in the past. You will see new releases, new platforms and integration with other products owned by GrapeCity, including their ActiveReports reporting components.

You can rest assure that we will continue our award winning support and documentation. Our goal is to make it even better. GrapeCity chose to keep each and every FarPoint employee, so the familiar faces you know will still be there.

FarPoint had a lot of goals that had not yet been met in the component marketplace. As we internally discussed how to better serve our customers and meet our goals, we felt that we needed to be bigger. That led us to pursuing a closer relationship with GrapeCity. This acquisition truly is a win-win for everyone involved, especially you the customer.

It is an exciting time to be a Spread user. Again, thank you for your support of FarPoint over the past 18 years, and as we take this next step forward, we plan to far exceed your expectations in the future. As always, we encourage your feedback.

Rick Williamson

CEO, FarPoint Technologies

Spread for SharePoint now provides full binding-support for SQL Data Tables

robby — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 14:21:00 GMT

Sometimes you know exactly what you're doing, and you know exactly how to do it. Other times you give it your best shot, and hope for good results

When we released Spread for SharePoint v1 we entered a new market with a product that we feel offers considerable benefits to our customers. At the same time, we recognize it as a product that requires guidance from our customers to help us refine it's direction. We have received considerable feedback, and we are working to implement your suggestions. Spread for SharePoint v2 is our first release in this feedback-driven process.

A consistent message we received was that customers want a web part that binds to SQL Data Tables and provides the ability to write changes back to the Data Tables. That feature is the primary feature addition to Spread for SharePoint v2.

When you enter Edit Mode for the web part, the Tool Pane allows you to specify your binding type: SharePoint List or SQL Data Table. For this sample, I will bind to a SQL Data Table. This is achieved by specifying the SQL Server Name and the Database Name. The web part queries the meta data from the SQL Database and populates the Table Name dropdown with the database tables and views that can be used as a binding source.

Once a table or view is selected, the columns are displayed. The page designer can choose which columns to display, the column index (display location) of each column, and whether there should be a totals footer for each column.

If the ability to write back to the SQL Data Tables is desired (full data binding), then the SQL Commands can then be automatically generated. This creates the basic CRUD (Create, Update, Delete) SQL commands that will be used by the web part to keep the database up to date with changes made in Spread for SharePoint. You can modify the contents of the commands to customize the binding experience.

If grouping of the SQL data is desired, this can be performed from the Group By section of the Too lPane. Specifying grouping from the Tool Pane saves the grouping information with the web part serialization so it will persist in shared views. If the page designer also wants to allow for dynamic grouping by the site users, they can enable the "Show Group Bar" checkbox.

When you apply the settings to the web part, the binding is compete. In the following image, I have also performed dynamic grouping by dragging column headers to the Group Bar.

And in this image, I am illustrating how filtering can also be used with grouping. Notice the filter bar at the top is specifying to filter all items where "CustomerID is equal to 'ALFKI'" and the grouping is being performed on the resulting filtered record items. Also notice that the totals footer is updated to include only the filtered records.

We are excited about the new functionality we have added to Spread for SharePoint, and look forward to more customer input and feedback.

Robby Powell

Input Pro for Silverlight June 2009 is released!

Jimmy — Wed, 01 Jul 2009 07:08:00 GMT

Several days ago we released Input Pro for Silverlight June 2009 - the first official release of this product. We believe this powerful input control suite will greatly enhance the input experience of your Silverlight applications and make the task of receiving and validating data from end users much easier.

We've added several important features and fixed some bugs since the preview version was released. One of such features is the new FpElasticSlider control:

It is the one used to change the edit value in date time and numeric controls. Unlike the standard slider control defining value range, FpElasticSlider controls the rate of change by firing Updating events in a frequency specified by the ball's offset from midpoint. The more offset, the more frequent. This makes the end users be able to easily change a value to a desired value by sliding. If you want to have a try, go to the demo page.

Another useful new feature is validation states. Users can use MaxValue and MinValue to define the data range of Input Pro controls, or handle Validating event to do custom validation. When validation fails, the control will enter invalid state:

We also added an AutoDropDown feature for date time controls. When you edit the text portion of date time controls, the calendar can automatically pop up and sync with the value change.

Here I just list some of the new features. See more info about the product, check out Input Pro for Silverlight.

Win a Trip to PDC!

donald — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 14:49:00 GMT

INETA is sponsoring the INETA Component Code Challenge, with the winner receiving a scholarship to PDC 2009 in Los Angeles, CA. All you need to do is build the best application using Spread and another component.

The Details:
Build a .NET Application (WinForms, ASP.NET, WPF, Silverlight, Compact Framework, etc.) using at least 2 components from at least 2 different approved vendors (yes, FarPoint is an approved vendor) then make a 3-5 minute Camtasia video showing your entry and describing what components you used and why your application is cool. Our judges will review the submissions and the best two will win a scholarship to PDC 2009 in Los Angeles, CA, including air fare, hotel, and conference pass. The submission deadline is 08/25/2009 at Midnight Eastern and the winners will be announced on 09/14/2009. Entries will be judged on four criteria:

•             Effective use of a component to solve a problem/display data
•             innovative use of components
•             Impact using components (i.e. reduction in lines of code written, increased productivity, etc.)
•             Most creative use of a component.

See the contest page (http://ineta.org/codechallenge) on the INETA web site for more details and full rules.

That’s it. So what are you waiting for? Show them how you are using Spread today and possibly win a free trip to PDC. Good luck!

Spread for ASP.NET is a ‘Finalist’

donald — Thu, 07 May 2009 20:15:00 GMT

We just found out that Spread for ASP.NET is a finalist in the ‘Best Grid’ category, as voted by the asp.netPRO readers. Ya, we know, it’s a spreadsheet but that category wasn’t available. Just goes to show you the power of a spreadsheet. Thanks to everyone who voted for us!

Check out the latest features of Spread for ASP.NET here:
http://www.fpoint.com/netproducts/spreadweb/spread.aspx

Spread 8 COM With XLSX (Excel 2007 support) Released!

petew — Thu, 07 May 2009 18:47:00 GMT

This is ready for all Spread 8 customers to download now! Here is the link:

http://www.clubfarpoint.com/FarPointSupportSite/Modules/Download/updates.aspx

For those of you who have been waiting to upgrade to Spread 8 we are open for business so please give us a call: 919-460-4551 or if you would like to download a trial first here is the link:

http://www.clubfarpoint.com/FarPointSupportSite/Modules/Download/trials.aspx?pcode=spread

Thanks,

Pete

New Training Dates for 2009

petew — Wed, 01 Apr 2009 15:19:00 GMT

Hello! I am happy to announce that our training guru, Mr. Microsoft MVP himself Jim Duffy has posted the training dates for 2009!

Feel free to go to his website www.takenote.com and find out when you or your team can take a training class and become an expert in our .Spread for Windows and/or Spread for ASP.NET spreadsheets!

Last year we only had one class but man was it popular and effective! This year we have multiple dates to choose from. Jim will also come to your company if you are interested so feel free to ask him!

If the following quote from Dan Grider at Finsh Line does not get you interested, I do not what will!

"Jim Duffy breaks FarPoint Spread down and shows you how this object's feature set can be implemented to enhance what you're currently doing with

datagrids. Remember, it's not a grid...it's a spread.  I really didn't understand until I saw the many options and flexibility the FarPoint Grid has to offer.

Thoroughly enjoyed this class!"

Spread for ASP.NET 4 maintenance release (now IE8 ready)

scotts — Fri, 27 Mar 2009 16:30:21 GMT

Yesterday afternoon we released the new maintenance release for Spread for ASP.NET 4. For the second maintenance release in a row we decided to add functionality to the release rather than just fixing the bugs. In the December release, we shipped the 3.5 framework build of the Spread with support for Dynamic Data web sites. Yesterdays release provides full support for Internet Explorer 8. If you are planning on using a spreadsheet or grid control in IE8, then you can know with confidence that the FarPoint Spread for ASP.NET product has been tested and will fully support this environment.

Vote for Spread for ASP.NET!

donald — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 14:30:00 GMT

It’s once again that time of year to vote for your favorite Grid and Component Suite! We would love to have you support us. Please visit the asp.netPRO web site and vote now:

http://www.aspnetpro.com/awards/default.asp

We are entered in the following categories:

#7: “Component Set” – Spread for .NET Bundle nominated
#12 “Grid” – Spread for ASP.NET nomiated

Please vote now as it ends on April 25. Thanks from all of us at FarPoint!

- Donald

Come Meet Us!

donald — Wed, 04 Mar 2009 15:58:00 GMT

What a busy (and hopefully warmer!) March it’s going to be. If you’re going to be in the Southeast region this month, stop by any of these events and say hello to Scott Shorter, our Technical Evangelist. He’d love to meet you!

MSDN Southern Fried Roadshow
Friday, March 13 - Alpharetta, GA
http://msevents.microsoft.com/CUI/EventDetail.aspx?EventID=1032403861&Culture=en-US
We’re partnering up with the Microsoft Regional Evangelists to help bring you the 4-day Roadshow held in several locations

The Atlanta Code Camp
Saturday, March 14 – Atlanta, GA
http://atlantacodecamp.com/

“Battle of the Third-Party Controls”
Wednesday, March 18th
http://www.swfldev.net/
Scott will be presenting our Spread for ASP.NET product to the SW Florida .Net Developers Group.

There’s also the Charlotte Code Camp held on March 28th - http://www.developersguild.org/Default.aspx?alias=www.developersguild.org/codecamp/2009/spring

Again, if you’re in the area, stop by say hello!

Introducing InputPro for Silverlight

Jimmy — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 01:13:00 GMT

Data input and validation are essential part of almost all applications. A set of highly dependable and flexible input controls can relieve the burden of application developers and make them concentrate on the core business logic. InputPro for Silverlight is created to focus on data input and validation and tries to be such a control set in Silverlight.

InputPro for Silverlight is a brand new product designed from scratch. We take time to design it and try to make it powerful but still easy-to-use. Our philosophy is make basic things easy and hard things possible. We hope this philosophy could result in consistent and concise interfaces and fluent input experience. Here are some highlights of the control set:

Fully support .NET format strings and format providers. We don't want to invent a new format language and force the user to learn it. The date time controls support both Standard Date and Time Format Strings and Custom Date and Time Format Strings, and the number controls support both Standard Numeric Format Strings and Custom Numeric Format Strings. DateTimeFormatInfo and NumberFormatInfo are also supported respectively to enable more flexible format control.
Internationalization and localization support. By utilizing .NET parsing and formatting, the controls are built-in culture-aware. The date time controls also have local calendar (Japanese currently) and timezone support.
Smart and fluent input experience. We did a lot of jobs to help the user enter a correct value fluently. Character filtering, smart caret movement, spinning, value slider etc. are all the helpers.
Unlimited and customizable undo/redo. We make every single edit operation undoable. The length of undo queue is unlimited (limited by the available memory) by default, but you can explicitly set a limit on it. You can also programmatically create a custom undo unit by calling the BeginChange and EndChange methods. Custom undo units behave same as other undo units.
Customizable parsing and formatting. If you are not satisfied with the default parsing and formatting, you can handle corresponding events to add your own parsing/formatting logic.
Customizable key/command binding. The commands include both basic keyboard operations (caret movement, text selection etc.) and useful shortcuts (spin, clear, drop-down etc.). There's a default binding key for each command, but you can also change it with your own.

The first preview build of InputPro for Silverlight has been published. You can try the demo and download the build here. This build includes the following controls:

Date time controls:

FpDateTime: value type is DateTime.
FpDateTimeOffset: value type is DateTimeOffset, a new added type since .NET Framework 2.0 sp1, recommended to be the default date and time type for application development by MSDN.

Numeric controls:

FpDecimal: value type is Decimal.
FpDouble: value type is Double.
FpInteger: value type is Int32.
FpLongInteger: value type is Int64.

Mask control:

FpMaskedTextBox

Text control:

FpTextBox

Controls to support the above controls:

FpCalculator
FpErrorReminder
FpSpinButton

These controls are currently in Preview Quality Band and are open to feature requests and feedback. I'll write more about these controls in the following days. Your comments are important for us to make a better product. Please try the demo and tell us what you think about it:

InputPro for Silverlight Demo Page

InputPro for Silverlight - Preview

robby — Wed, 28 Jan 2009 14:40:00 GMT

FarPoint Technologies, and the InputPro for Silverlight team are proud to announce the Preview of our first Silverlight product - a set of Silverlight Input Controls - InputPro for Silverlight. Based the Quality Bands introduced with the Silverlight Toolkit, InputPro for Silverlight is well within the Preview Band for features and quality, and we are now at the point in the production cycle where we can no longer "develop in a bubble" so please let us know what you think. We need your feedback to direct us, and to let us know how these components stack up from functionality and usability perspectives.

We decided to create this set of input controls because we need a sophisticated, highly programmable and customizable, set of input controls to use as celltypes for our upcoming Silverlight spreadsheet component - Spread for Silverlight component that is currently in the design/dev process. We have not yet decided how we are going to deliver InputPro – as a stand-alone product, or as part of a suite, and we have not decided on a price. Any feedback from the dev community would be apprecieated here as well.

We are very excited to officially announce our entry into the Silverlight market, and look forward to your remarks and comments.

Spread for Asp.NET application broke with last Vista Windows Update? Mine too.

scotts — Fri, 23 Jan 2009 14:40:43 GMT

Yesterday, we had two enquiries about customers web application that was using ClientAutoCalculation was no longer working (just stopped). When I tested this on my Vista computer, I saw the same behavior. So, when I got to my work computer (Windows XP), I tested this again and had no problems. So I started debugging the issue on my Vista computer and found the problem in our fpspread.htc file (this is the JavaScript that gets attached to the Spread object client side). The problem was on this line of code.

if (window.external) req = window.external.XMLHttpRequest;

The problem was XMLHttpRequest was not a property of window.external and was throwing an exception and so our AJAX callback was not working. This all came due to a Windows Update earlier this week on my Vista computer. My first thought was this was going to break customers web applications who are using version 2.5 and higher of Spread for ASP.NET, but the development team said this line of code was added only to version 4 for use with our Spread for SharePoint product.

SO... We have fixed the line of code and have posted the new htc file on our ftp server.

ftp://ftp.fpoint.com/SpreadASPNET4/fpspreadhtc.zip

AND... We should be updating the latest maintenance release setups with the new client script file shortly.

If you are using Spread for ASP.NET 4 and have users browsing to it on IE7 in Vista, then you will need to get this latest script file and replace it in your web application.

Thank you Ngu Soon Hui

scotts — Tue, 13 Jan 2009 16:24:13 GMT

This FarPoint customer just posted a great blog on using the CustomTypeDescriptor with objects bound to the FarPoint Spread. He also mentions one of the reasons why he likes the FarPoint Spread over the built in DataGridView control. Take a look at Mr. Ngu’s blog and see how he shared his “FarPoint Experience”. but don’t stop there, share your “FarPoint Experience” with others through your personal blogs, posting to our forums solutions you have found, making presentations to your local .NET Users Group, or any other way you can think of and let us know about it.

14 Years!!!

scotts — Fri, 02 Jan 2009 21:43:35 GMT

Today marks my 14th anniversary with FarPoint Technologies. For someone who knew relatively nothing about developing computer software, FarPoint gave me a chance to learn and share with others their terrific Spread products. And I thank them for this opportunity.

I was working for a Midwest computer company providing hardware support (and customer service) when the phone rang that September 1994 day. I answered the phone which had the very irate President of FarPoint on the other end. I was use to these kind of calls because of the lack of good QA at the company I was at. I quickly and efficiently (IMHO) calmed the customer and told him how I will make sure the situation would be rectified. (I decided to do what a Floor Manager would have done because they were busy and I knew it was the right thing to do). The customer (President of FarPoint) quieted down quickly and then said "Anybody who can listen to me the way you just did and give me the support you just did I want working for me". That is when I saw the 919 area code and said
I am from North Carolina and would love to move back". He said whenever you want to come back to NC, you will have a job". I was down in just a couple of months and been on this exciting ride ever since.

One of the great benefits of working for FarPoint is the family atmosphere and how everyone works as a team to better everyone. I quickly learned the FarPoint product and the development environment that most customers I would be working with would be using thanks to this fact. I am now the moderator on our forums, answering support/sales/presales phone calls, exhibiting at trade shows, and speaking about our product as much as possible. I get to meet many people and share what FarPoint is doing and how we can help them succeed in their development.

I am looking forward to many more years working with everyone and hope to take this one step further to evangelize our customers to want to share their FarPoint experience with others. We have many things we are working on this year at FarPoint and can't wait to share them with you. Happy New Year everyone.

Scott Shorter
Technical Evangelist

Things You Didn't Know About Spread for Windows Forms: The Formula Provider Control

Kevin — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 14:31:00 GMT

If you have done any development with Spread for Windows Forms you've probably come to realize by now that there is so much packed into this product that you may never fully grasp what all it can do. With that in mind we've decided to start blogging on some of the lesser known features that you might not yet have uncovered and show you some more of what Spread can do for you.

For our first blog we decided to talk about the Formula Provider control. Now if this is the first time you have heard about the Formula Provider control don't feel bad because you aren't the only one. Spread for Windows Forms is full of these little surprises. When I was first approached to write this blog posting I believe my response was "The Formula what control?"

So what then exactly is the Formula Provider control? The Formula Provider is a component which allows us to create a Formula property as an extended property for controls. After the formula expression is assigned, it’ll be calculated automatically. Now what does that mean exactly? Well, let's take a look by walking through a simple project, so if you haven't already started Visual Studio to look for this mysterious component do so now. If you've already installed Spread for Windows Forms you should be able to locate the Formula Provider control in the Spread Components group. Drag both a Spread and a Formula Provider to your form. Since the Formula Provider is a non-GUI control it will not display on your form directly. However, what you should now notice in the property grid for the Spread control are two new properties, Formula and FormulaTriggerEvent. You should also drag a NumericUpDown control to your form and initialize it as follows:

NumericUpDown1.Increment = .25

NumericUpDown1.Minimum = .25

NumericUpDown1.DecimalPlaces = 2

NumericUpDown1.Maximum = 4

NumericUpDown1.Value = 1

FpSpread1.Height = 200

FpSpread1.Width = 400

Now the idea for this example is simply to alter the Spread's ZoomFactor and its dimensions based on the value of the NumericUpDown control. This is a simple and fairly common feature you might have added to one of your projects already. To accomplish this with the Formula Provider control all we need to do is set the Formula property in the property grid for the Spread control to the following:

ZoomFactor=NumericUpDown1.Value

What you should notice now is an arrow drawn from the NumericUpDown control to the Spread control signifying that the two controls are bound together. Compile and run your project. What you should see is that when you change the value in the NumericUpDown control the Spread will zoom in and out.

The other property added to the Spread was the FormulaTriggerEvent. This property specifies the event on the control which will trigger Formula recalculations. Each control has a Default event which will trigger the recalculation. For the NumericUpDown control that is the ValueChanged event. But suppose we didn't want the Formula to be recalculated while the mouse is held down over the spin buttons in the NumericUpDown control? Simple enough. Just go to the property grid for the NumericUpDown control and changed the value of the FormulaTriggerEvent to MouseUp. This tells the Formula Provider that formulas dependent on the NumericUpDown control should not recalculate until the mouse is released over the NumericUpDown control. If you now compile and run your project you should notice that the Spread's ZoomFactor does not change until you stop spinning the NumericUpDown control.

Now up to this point we have only worked on changing the ZoomFactor for the Spread but have not yet altered its dimensions. Here is where we get to really show off what this control can do. If we go back to the property grid for Spread and look at the Formula property added by the Formula Provider control we see how we effected the change to the ZoomFactor property but how would we alter multiple properties at once? And how would we calculate a Height and Width for the Spread based on the value of the NumericUpDown control?

What is so powerful about the Formula Provider control is that it has access to the FarPoint CalcEngine. So in writing out our Formulas we can use Spread's CalcEngine formulas, custom names and even custom functions to accomplish our tasks. So let's alter our Formula now to take advantage of this new found knowledge.

Change the Formula property in the property grid for Spread from

ZoomFactor=NumericUpDown1.Value

ZoomFactor=NumericUpDown1.Value;Width=Product(START_WIDTH,NumericUpDown1.Value);Height=Product(START_HEIGHT,NumericUpDown1.Value)

Upon closer inspection we see that we now are modifying three properties of the Spread control, ZoomFactor, Width and Height. Each property affected is separated by a semi-colon in the formula string . We are also using two custom names START_WIDTH and START_HEIGHT which we will need to define later on. Finally, we are using the Product formula from the Spread CalcEngine formulas to calculate the Width and Height.

Before testing our project we will need to add some code in our Form_Load and in one new event we need to add for the Formula Provider. First, lets go to the Form_Load event and add the following code:

FormulaProvider1.BeginInit()

FormulaProvider1.AddQueryValueName("START_HEIGHT")

FormulaProvider1.AddQueryValueName("START_WIDTH")

FormulaProvider1.EndInit()

This code will add the custom names, START_HEIGHT and START_WIDTH into the Formula Provider so they can be queried as needed. The BeginInit and EndInit methods must be used when adding any custom values or functions.

We will also need to handle the QueryValue event for the FormulaProvider control so we can supply the Formula Provider with the values for our custom names. Add the following code.

Private Sub FormulaProvider1_QueryValue(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal arg As FarPoint.Win.Spread.QueryValueEventArgs) Handles FormulaProvider1.QueryValue

If arg.CustomName = "START_HEIGHT" Then

arg.Result = 200

ElseIf arg.CustomName = "START_WIDTH" Then

arg.Result = 400

End If

End Sub

Now if we compile and run the project we should see that our control sizes along with the ZoomFactor whenever the NumericUpDown control's value is changed.

So there you have it. The Formula Provider control. A nifty little component tucked away in your toolbox and dusted off courtesy of FarPoint Technologies. Keep an eye out on this blog in the future for more tips on some of the lesser known features of Spread for Windows Forms.

How to disable logging in WSS.

Albert — Tue, 30 Dec 2008 03:26:00 GMT

For a developer of WSS or MOSS, you may be interesting in this idea - disable the logging(default is on) for SharePoint for the sake of performance. Of course this should be done only for your debugging environment. It's strongly recommended to enable the logging for any of your production servers. Else you may not able to troubleshoot any WSS errors.

Go to your WSS Central Administration -> Operations -> Logging and Reporting
Click on Diagnostic Logging
- Customer Experience Improvement Program: select No, I don't wish to participate.
- Error Reports: select Ignore errors and don't collect information
- Trace log: clear the entire Path.
- Click OK.
Click on Usage Analysis Processing
- Uncheck Enable logging
- Click OK
Click on Information Management Policy Usage Reports. Uncheck Enable recurring policy usage reports.