HTML5 Gantt Chart components: in development

As we have previously announced, we’re currently working to develop a Gantt Chart control library based on HTML5 and its new inline SVG features that are already available within all modern browsers.

Eventually the output JavaScript code could be extended and wrapped into ASP .NET controls for Web application developers (on the .NET platform), and, separately, as Metro style app components relying on WinRT for Windows 8 (and possiblly also Windows Phone 8) developers.

In order to support both these types of usage, and even more scenarios in the future (for example, PHP and other Web developers could use DlhSoft Gantt Chart components for the first time provided that they couldn’t have accepted Silverlight output in their output Web sites), we will enable component themeing with two built-in style sets: Aero and Metro. Moreover, we are going to enable virtually unlimited task shape customizations by allowing developers to inject JavaScript code that defines how task bars are presented, just as the WPF version does with bar templating. All these are going to be supported besides the basic set of features collected from our previously available Gantt Chart and Schedule Chart controls for .NET and related technologies.

var items = [   { content: “Task 1”, isExpanded: false }, […]   { content: “Task 2”, isExpanded: true },   { content: “Task 2.1”, indentation: 1,     start: new Date(2012, 5, 2, 8, 0, 0),     finish: new Date(2012, 5, 3, 16, 0, 0),     completedFinish: new Date(2012, 5, 3, 16, 0, 0),     assignmentsContent: “Resource 1, Resource 2 [50%]” },   { content: “Task 2.2”, indentation: 1 },   { content: “Task 2.2.1”, indentation: 2,     start: new Date(2012, 5, 3, 8, 0, 0),     finish: new Date(2012, 5, 5, 16, 0, 0),     assignmentsContent: “Resource 2” },   { content: “Task 2.2.2”, indentation: 2,     start: new Date(2012, 5, 4, 12, 0, 0),     finish: new Date(2012, 5, 6, 12, 0, 0),     completedFinish: new Date(2012, 5, 5, 12, 0, 0) },   { content: “Milestone 2.A”, indentation: 1,     start: new Date(2012, 5, 6, 16, 0, 0), isMilestone: true }]; var ganttChartView = document.querySelector(“#ganttChartView”); DlhSoft.Controls.GanttChartView.initialize(ganttChartView, items);

What do you think? Would you expect to need such controls in the short or long future? Do you have any suggestions at this early development stages for our team? We’ll be glad to add your feedback to the internally managed requirement list of the product, either for the first version or for a future one. Of course, it’s a lot better to get your ideas earlier rather than later, as it’s always easier to alter the software design, if needed, in the initial phases of a project, rather than after its first version release. Thank you very much in advance!

Lower prices for licensing core Gantt Chart components only

As you might know, DlhSoft offers several Gantt Chart and other scheduling and project management components, packaged into multiple products. However, you might have also observed that the available WPF ad Silverlight™ products have prices that started at €699 (that is almost 63% more than the €429 starting point for Windows® Forms versions), and some visitors and customers even contacted us to request specific discounts.

We’ve listened to all feedback and we are glad to let you know that a new Basic Edition license set for Gantt Chart Light Library is now available to be purchased from our Web site. The prices start at €429 and the licenses provide access to all core components of the library for all types of production purposes: Gantt Chart controls (with and without attached hierarchical data grid) and Schedule Chart controls (also with and without attached hierarchical data grid).

By purchasing a license for the Basic Edition of the product you don’t receive access to advanced project management features (such as load charts, PERT charts, and network diagrams) of the standard version, tough, but sometimes they are not even needed in your applications. (The source code of the library is not available either with Basic Edition licenses, i.e. the Business Plus license type is not available in this case, as the downloadable software package is actually the same for both versions.) Anyway, if the developer would find out that he or she needs advanced features later, a simple mathematical difference payment would be enough in order to upgrade and receive an updated license file.

If you are interested, you may purchase a Basic Edition product license right now. Enjoy!

PERT Network Diagram

We are happy to announce that a new NetworkDiagramView control has just arrived within Gantt Chart Light Library for Silverlight™ 4 and WPF 4, and Project Management Library for WPF 4 (besides the PertChartView control that we have also recently introduced to the same products):

It can be integrated with GanttChartDataGrid or GanttChartTaskListView controls using their new GetNetworkDiagramItems methods, and even with third party components by using the static NetworkDiagramView.GetNetworkDiagramItems method to generate powerful project management applications.

It’s also fully configurable using shape templates. For example, you can generate network diagram in place task editors with little custom code as in this small sample application (Silverlight or WPF):

Finally, the new control is 100% free to all customers owning a license for version 4.* of any of the specified products. (Although a license upgrade purchase request submission is required to use the new control, don’t worry: the discounted price of the transaction would be zero.) Enjoy!

Gantt Chart component replacements

For several reasons (even unknown), sometimes component library producers or publishers choose to discontinue their products at random times without prior notice to their potential new customers (i.e. developers). And although such publishers might continue supporting their previously existing customers for a short while, that’s not good at all for those developers either, on the long term, as successful applications (possibly developed using discontinued components) tend to get long lifecycles. We strongly disagree with this practice, but we’ve seen it happening from time to time, including among successful well-known .NET Gantt Chart component providers.

For example, in February 2012, IBM® has abruptly discontinued its ILOG® Gantt visualization components for .NET, supplementary stating that they will provide support to existing customers only until September 2014.

If you have previously used such Gantt Chart controls or project management frameworks that are no longer available or supported, and you need to switch to an alternative component library provider, we wanted to let you know that DlhSoft is here to help: we have several products that may fit your needs, requiring as little changes in your application as possible.

Whether you need more information about our Gantt Chart and project management libraries, or would like further support in order to convert your applications and use our components instead, don’t hesitate to ask. We try to always be as responsive as possible.

By the way, we have full featured and unlimited trial versions for all our products so you can completely test their capacity to integrate into your application and replacing the previously used components before you actually purchase any DlhSoft product licenses.

Finally, it may also be important for you to know that all our product licenses are perpetual, and that the Business Plus licenses also include full source code archives, so you can rest assured that, even that it would probably never be the case as our controls are designed to be very configurable and easily extensible without the need to access their internal source code, you could always modify the core of any referenced component whenever needed.

High Performance Gantt Chart Controls for Silverlight™ and WPF: past, present, and future versions

A couple of years ago, many customers were keeping sending feedback to DlhSoft, saying:

• We need Web (Silverlight™) Gantt Charts! and/or
• We have many tasks to display, we need higher performance!

Back then (and continously since) we’ve worked hard and eventually launched a new Gantt Chart Light Library product containing high performance, lightweight Gantt Chart controls (available for both Silverlight™ 4 and WPF 4) and then new versions and builds have followed, adding more features almost weekly.

The heart of the product is the GanttChartDataGrid control which essentially builds a Gantt Chart visualization to the right side of a synchronized tree-grid (that actually inherits basic behavior from the standard DataGrid control).

Version 4.1 included new controls:

• ScheduleChartDataGrid: displaying multiple assignments per row, so that you can build resource scheduling applications;
• LoadChartDataGrid: displaying allocation load information for resources in a timeline based chart that can easily be sinchronized to a Gantt Chart or Schedule Chart.

Today, version 4.2 (free to download and try for unlimited time) also includes a new PertChartView control that has also been much requested in the past. (We’ve covered some of its features in a previous post.)

In the short future we intend to also add a NetworkDiagramView control that would extend the project management suite of controls with a different topic situated somewhere between the Gantt Chart and the PERT Chart: a network diagram. And we also have more ideas for later, but that’s a story for another time.

PERT Chart

The new versions 4.2 of Gantt Chart Light Library for Silverlight™/WPF 4 and 4.1 of Project Management Library for WPF 4 include a new control: PertChartView (within the new DlhSoft.ProjectData.PertChart.LightWPF.Controls assembly).

PertChartView control may be used to display a simple PERT chart using items and dependencies that are either created in code behind or received as auto-generated based on data within existing GanttChartDataGrid and, respectively, GanttChartTaskListView control instances using their (also) new GetPertChartItems methods.

Alternatively, in specific custom scenarios, you may also use the static PertChartView.GetPertChartItems method to easily generate items for displaying as a PERT chart in your application based on custom activity items (that just need to support PertChartView.IActivity interface, or – when your activity type cannot be altered to support that interface directly – they could be wrapped within a new data object type implementing it and referring the original objects).

In all cases, when you have a large, multi-level activity hierarchy (using indentation values) you can pass a maxIndentation parameter to GetPertChartItems methods (by default it is unlimited). If you use zero, for example, only the root nodes of the hierarchy would be considered for displaying the PERT Chart.

Finally, end users would be able to manually drag and drop task event shapes on the screen to reposition them for a better view, or you, as a developer, could write code to do that by setting DisplayedRowIndex and DisplayedColumnIndex properties of PertChartItem (although they have “Index” suffix and are usually expected to be integer values, don’t worry, they are actually double values, so you can position items wherever you want, whenever you need).

Moreover, the critical path of the PERT chart (based only on activity effort values and the event dependencies) can be easily highlighted within the chart, and generally, you can manually apply custom appearance settings to all task event shapes and dependency lines in the chart from code behind.

Undo/Redo

If you use GanttChartDataGrid (or another) control from DlhSoft Gantt Chart Light Library (available for both Silverlight™ and WPF) and you need built-in Undo/Redo support to enable an action queue in your application:

• set IsUndoEnabled property of the control instance to true;
• determine whether undoing or redoing actions is possible at any moment by calling CanUndo and CanRedo methods of the control;
• call Undo and Redo methods whenever needed (e.g. when the end user clicks one of the the Undo and Redo buttons or menu items in your own toolbar or menu).

If you want to customize the feature further, these properties will probably help you:

• UndoLimit – allows you to specify a limit for the internal Undo queue (to limit internal memory usage);
• UndoLinkingTimeLimit – allows you to specify a time interval value to consider when linking separate actions as action groups to be undone and redone together (very useful for recording partially continuous drag and drop operations as unitary actions);
• UndoQueueCount – retreives how many unitary actions are currently recorded within the Undo queue (you can clear the queue by calling ClearUndoQueue method, if needed).