Add New Item fix for Visual Studio 2005 and Telerik WinForms

If you're someone that still sometimes uses visual Studio 2005, and you are using Telerik Controls for WinForms, then you might have noticed if you add a new item to a project, then it always defaults to a RadForm, no matter what item you choose.

This will be fixed in one of the upcoming releases of the Telerik controls for Winforms but in the meantime, there is an easy way to fix this.

Move all of the files from the following folder (assuming Visual Studio is installed in it's default location):
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\IDE\ItemTemplates\VisualBasic\Windows Forms
to:
C:\Program Files\Microsoft Visual Studio 8\Common7\IDE\ItemTemplates\VisualBasic
Open a Visual Studio 2005 Command Prompt
Use the following command:
devenv /setup
Wait for the command to finish

Telerik releases Q3 2010 SP1 for WinForms

Just out, the latest SP1 release for Q3 2010 for WiForms. This release has a host of fixes and added functionality for
The Telerik Presentation Framework, RadCommandBar, RadDropDownList, RadListControl, RadGridView, RadMenu, RadApplicationMenu, RadPageView, RadRibbonbar, RadScheduler, RadSchedulerNavigator, RadStatusStrip and Visual Studio Extensions.

Check out the Release Notes or get the Free Trial Version here.

Telerik to add Wizard Control to its collection

For some time I've been using Telerik WinForms controls and they are an intergral part of our software. There are few controls that are missing and Telerik has an aggressive release strategy meaning that the existing controls are updated frequently and new controls are often added.

One of the few controls that I missed though was a decent wizard control. We already use a third party wizard control in our software but with the lack of the familiar theme, it looks a little out of place.

I'm please to see though that Telerik have once again responded and will be providing a Wizard control in Q1 2011 release.

to find out more about the roadmap of Telerik WinForms products have a look at the WinForms RoadMap

Localize Telerik RadReminder

Like most of the offerings from the Telerik WinForms suite, it is possible to localize the RadReminder. However, this does not seem to be documented at the moment on the Telerik website.

localizing the RadReminder is easy and just like localizing all the other RadControls.

• Start by creating a descendant of the RadReminderLocalizationProvider class.
• Override the GetLocalizedString(string id) method and provide a translation for the messages. If a translation is not provided, the default value will be returned. This behavior is guaranteed by the call to the base GetLocalizedString method in the default clause of the switch statement in the example

Public Class MyRadReminderLocalizationProvider

    Inherits Telerik.WinControls.UI.RadReminderLocalizationProvider

    Public Overrides Function GetLocalizedString(ByVal id As String) As String

        Select Case id

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormButtonDismiss

                Return "Dismiss"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormButtonDismissAll

                Return "Dismiss All"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormButtonOpenItem

                Return "Open Item"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormButtonSnooze

                Return "Snooze"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormColumnDueIn

                Return "Due in"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormColumnSubject

                Return "Subject"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormLabelSnooze

                Return "Click Snooze to be reminded again in:"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormReminder

                Return "Reminder"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormReminders

                Return "Reminders"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeEightHours

                Return "8 hours"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeFifteenMinutes

                Return "15 minutes"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeFiveMinutes

                Return "5 minutes"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeFourDays

                Return "4 days"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeFourHours

                Return "4 hours"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeHalfDay

                Return "0.5 days"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeOneDay

                Return "1 day"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeOneHour

                Return "1 hour"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeOneMinute

                Return "1 minute"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeOneWeek

                Return "1 week"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeTenMinutes

                Return "10 minutes"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeThirtyMinutes

                Return "30 minutes"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeThreeDays

                Return "3 days"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeTwoDays

                Return "2 days"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeTwoHours

                Return "2 hours"

            Case RadReminderStringId.AlarmFormSnoozeTwoWeeks

                Return "2 weeks"

            Case RadReminderStringId.DueInDay

                Return "day"

            Case RadReminderStringId.DueInDays

                Return "days"

            Case RadReminderStringId.DueInHour

                Return "hour"

            Case RadReminderStringId.DueInHours

                Return "hours"

            Case RadReminderStringId.DueInMinute

                Return "minute"

            Case RadReminderStringId.DueInOverdue

                Return "overdue"

            Case RadReminderStringId.DueInWeek

                Return "week"

            Case RadReminderStringId.DueInWeeks

                Return "weeks"

        End Select

                Return MyBase.GetLocalizedString(id)

    End Function

End Class

To apply the custom localization provider, instantiate and assign it to the current localization provider:

RadReminderLocalizationProvider.CurrentProvider = New MyRadReminderLocalizationProvider()

Telerik to provide WinForms Rich Text Editor Control

Telerik are to add to it's great suite of RadControls for WinForms a Rich Text Editor. Currnetly, they soliciting feedback on what features you would like to see from a Telerik WinForms Rich Text Editor.

If you're interested in seeing the industry leading component development company add this new product to the list of WinForms controls, then you can open a new support ticket with subject RichTextEditor, and send your responses of the following questions (feel free to extend these, if needed):

1. What format would you like to save the content in (HTML, XAML, XML, DOC, DOCX, etc)?
2. Will you need exporting functionality? If yes, what export formats will you need in your apps?
3. What advanced editing features will you need (for example table support, image support, etc)?
4. What is the main purpose of such a tool that you will need? For example, will you be editing documents, producing PDFs for archives, exporting data in other formats?
5. Do you plan to integrate the rich text editor with another product (such as reporting, CRM, etc)? If yes, we will appreciate it if you give us more details about your needs.
6. What other products have you used and what you like and dislike about them?
7. How would you feel if we use DirectWrite (this will require Vista SP2+ or Win7). How many of your customers are still using WinXP?
8. Would you prefer to use the new Ribbon interface, or the older menu/toolstrip setup?

I'll look forward to seeing this added to the controls.

Telerik RadCommandBar gets Load and Save Layout functionality

Those people over at Telerik have recently released the new Q3 Version for WinForms. In it there's some quite funky stuff as well as a whole new control called the RadCommandBar.

The RadCommandBar is the toolbar replacement for the RadToolStrip and has some additional features. But the one I'm looking at here is the ability to Load and Save the layout.

As the RadCommandBar allows a user to add and remove the items on the RadCommandBar (just like a Microsoft Office toolbar for example) and grab the ToolStrip rows and re-arrange them, you may want to save these preferences so that the next time the user launches your form, all the layout preferences of the RadCommandBar are as they left them.

Even though the RadCommandBar is new to the Telerik suite of WinForms controls, the documentation is pretty good, though this little documented feature is a real gem and very easy to use.

So, let's say you want to load the layout of a RadCommandBar on launching your form, simply write in the Form Load event

If My.Computer.FileSystem.FileExists("C:\MyCommandBar.xml") Then

          Me.RadCommandBar1.CommandBarElement.LoadLayout("C:\MyCommandBar.xml")

End If

Then when you close the form for exmaple:

Me.RadCommandBar1.CommandBarElement.SaveLayout("C:\MyCommandBar.xml")

It couldn't be much easier. Take a look at the overall feature of the RadCommandBar here.

What am I doing?

What am I doing? I don't know what made me start a blog now, or as yet what I'm going to blog about but for some reason I had the urge to start one.

Just recently, I've been spending many of my evenings sitting at my new laptop. My partner, upstairs preparing work, I thought that doing something constructive would be better than watching yet another episode of Top Gear on Dave (sorry Jeremy. I love you and your Hamster and Slow, but there are only so many re-runs I can take).

So, being a programmer, and a big fan of the Telerik components that we use in our daily development, I thought I'd start trying to help out in the Telerik Forums and submitting Code Library articles. There was no aim at first other than filling a couple of hours, but I quickly became quite taken with it.

Maybe you think this is a little sad, but I can tell you, it has huge benefits for more than just the people that I'm trying to answer questions for.

First off, yes, there's the satisfaction of having a response marked as answer by another fellow developer who needed help. My own knowledge of the products has rocketed, and this helps in my daily life at work. I also end up earning Telerik points for my company which means that we are now on track to get huge discounts on new products. It keeps me thinking of programming too. Some may say this is bad, but I really love it.

So, I want to thank Telerik for giving me some extra motivation. And, if you're a .NET prgrammer too, I'd suggest having a look at the Telerik controls.