WPF Team Blog

WPF — June 2026 Roadmap (v26.1)

Alexander Russkov (DevExpress) — Mon, 23 Feb 2026 02:00:00 Z

Thank you for choosing DevExpress and for your on-going support. We value your business.

In this blog post, I’ll highlight WPF-related features/capabilities we expect to ship in our upcoming mid-year release (v26.1, June 2026).

As always, if you have questions or suggestions, feel free to share your thoughts in the survey at the end of this post or submit a ticket via the DevExpress Support Center.

The information contained within this blog post details our current/projected development plans. Please note that this information is being shared for INFORMATIONAL PURPOSES ONLY and does not represent a binding commitment on the part of Developer Express Inc. This roadmap and the features/products listed within it are subject to change. You should not rely on or use this information to help make a purchase decision about Developer Express Inc products.

New WPF Fluent Theme (CTP)

We are working on a new Fluent Theme built on a flexible design token–based architecture. This foundation is designed to unlock a number of key benefits across our WPF product line, including:

Enhanced appearance
Support for Mica material
Flexible resource management and built-in palette customization
Multiple UI density modes
System high-contrast support
Centralized global font settings

Not all of the features listed above will be available in v26.1, and final scope may change as development progresses. In v26.1, we plan to introduce the new Fluent Theme for a subset of WPF controls as part of an initial Community Technology Preview (CTP).

By adopting a design token–driven approach, we can deliver new themes more efficiently in the future and ensure a unified visual language across multiple product lines. For example, in DevExpress-powered Blazor Hybrid applications, Blazor and WPF views will share a "common" look and feel based on the same Fluent theme.

WPF Fluent Icons

With v26.1, we expect to ship a comprehensive set of Fluent icons. To simplify migration to these new icons, you will be able to switch the icon set across all DevExpress controls using a single global setting. Our new collection will include thousands of Fluent icons which can be used in any UI element with SVG support.

WPF Grid Control

Column Drag & Drop Customization Events

We expect to introduce a new event to control which drag-and-drop operations are permitted for WPF Grid Control columns. This capability will address the following usage scenarios:

Prevent a column from being dropped at specific positions
Disable column reordering while still allow columns to be dragged out of the Grid or into the Column Chooser
Enforce fixed grouping order (for example, ensuring a specific column always has GroupIndex = 0)

You will be able to customize any column drag operation based on comprehensive information about the dragged column and the target area:

private void TableView_ColumnDragOver(object sender, ColumnDragOverEventArgs e) {
    if (e.TargetArea == HeaderArea.ColumnHeader) {
        e.Cancel = true;
    }

    // e.TargetArea
    // e.TargetIndex
    // e.SourceColumn
    // e.SourceIndex
    // e.SourceArea
    // ...
}

Expression Editor Support for Custom Format Conditions

With v26.1, users will be able to create advanced conditional formatting rules via custom expressions. This enhancement will allow users to define complex logic (such as [Created Date] > AddDays(LocalDateTimeToday(), -3) ) as requirements dictate (as you would expect, this feature/capability will offer increased flexibility when constructing formatting rules that rely on calculated values, functions, or advanced comparisons).

Dependency Injection Enhancements

With v26.1, we hope to enhance Dependency Injection (DI) support in our MVVM framework. We will introduce a new XAML markup extension that instantiates view models using a globally configured DI container:

var host = RegisterServices().Build();
IocServiceProvider.Default.ConfigureServices(host.Services);

<Window DataContext="{dxmvvm:Ioc Type={Binding ViewType}}" />

In addition, DevExpress MVVM services will automatically resolve views from the DI container during navigation. For example, in code below, HomeView will be created with IDataService and ILogger dependencies if they are registered in the container:

public class MainViewModel {
    private INavigationService NavigationService {
        get { return this.GetService<INavigationService>(); }
    }

    public void OnViewLoaded() {
        NavigationService.Navigate("HomeView", null, this);
    }
}

public class HomeView {
    public HomeView(IDataService dataService, ILogger logger) {
        //...
    }
}

Prompt to Expression in Filter Editor and Expression Editor

We will add AI-powered expression generation to our WPF controls to help users create filter and unbound column expressions for data-aware WPF controls using natural language prompts. Instead of writing complex expressions, users describe the desired logic in plain text. The system will send the prompt to the configured AI service, which will generate an expression for the control.

WPF Charts – DateOnly / Time Only Support

The DevExpress WPF Chart Control will support .NET DateOnly and TimeOnly data types. You’ll be able to use these types to specify arguments, values, workday/work time options, strips, constant lines, and scale breaks, as well as to apply data filters, sorting, and summaries.

WPF Pivot Grid

DateOnly / TimeOnly Support

The DevExpress WPF Pivot Grid will support DateOnly and TimeOnly data types (in .NET applications). You'll be able to use these types with for all data operations, including: filtering, grouping, calculating summaries etc.

Filter Panel Navigation

We plan to enhance the Pivot Grid’s Filter Panel to support keyboard navigation when filters are applied. Users will be able to navigate to the Filter Panel to remove individual filter nodes or modify the entire filter.

This enhancement will help applications that use DevExpress Pivot Grid meet WCAG Keyboard (Level A) accessibility requirements.

Template Kit Enhancements

We plan to extend DevExpress Template Kit support to include Visual Basic templates:

In addition, we expect to introduce usability updates (such as search) to simplify navigation across our extensive template library.

WPF TreeList – Performance Optimization

The DevExpress WPF TreeList will operate much faster when data is updated with a custom filter applied (via the CustomNodeFilter event). We have identified a performance bottleneck in this usage scenario and found a way to eliminate it. Internal testing demonstrates speed gains of up to ~85%.

WPF AI Chat Control Enhancements

We plan to introduce a set of small but useful APIs to help customize the DevExpress AI Chat Control. For example, new properties will allow you to specify the text displayed in an empty chat view and in an empty text input field.

WPF Spreadsheet

Screen Reader Support

To help meet accessibility standards, we’re beginning work on screen reader for the DevExpress Spreadsheet. As you'd expect, this feature will allow users to access document content via screen readers, such as Narrator and NVDA.

New Excel Functions

We will enhance our Spreadsheet calculation engine by adding support for modern, dynamic array-based Excel functions, including functions like:

XLOOKUP
XMATCH
SORT
FILTER
UNIQUE

WPF Reporting

Accessibility & Export Compliance

DOCX/HTML Export — AccessibleDescription Support

Organizations subject to WCAG 2.2 and Section 508 requirements will be able to include meaningful alternative text for all embedded images and graphical elements in exported Word documents and HTML pages. With v26.1, DevExpress Reports will apply a report control's AccessibleDescription property value to DOCX and HTML export output. This capability is especially relevant for controls exported as images, such as XRPictureBox, XRBarCode, XRShape, and XRChart, where assistive technologies rely on alternative text to describe visual content.

PDF/UA Export Enhancements

Government agencies and enterprises that must comply with PDF/UA standards will benefit from the following PDF export capabilities in v26.1:

XRRichText content will use proper semantic tagging and group continuous text into logical paragraphs instead of word-by-word <P> tags.
The AccessibleDescription property will apply to PDF signatures and AcroForm controls so that digitally signed or form-enabled PDF documents meet accessibility requirements.
XRPageInfo controls will support paragraph-level semantic markup.

Data Source Enhancements

DateTimeOffset Support

Applications that store time zone-aware timestamps, such as financial transaction logs, audit trails, and event scheduling systems, require DateTimeOffset support to preserve the original offset for accurate data representation. With v26.1, the Report Designer's Field List will display DateTimeOffset fields and allow data binding, filter, group, and sort operations across SqlDataSource, EFDataSource, and ObjectDataSource.

XRLabel & XRPanel — Custom Border Styles Example

Invoice layouts, financial statements, and reports with visually distinct section separators often require independent border configuration per side. We will extend the How to Create a Custom DevExpress Report Control GitHub repository with a new example that demonstrates custom XRLabel and XRPanel controls. These custom controls will allow you to define distinct border styles and width for top, bottom, left, and right sides independently.

IDE Integration

DevExpress Report Designer for JetBrains Rider — .NET Projects Support

In v25.2, we released the DevExpress Report Designer for JetBrains Rider with .NET Framework support. v26.1 will extend this integration to .NET-based projects. We also expect to deliver enhancements such as property search and reset in the Properties panel, along with light/dark theme support to match the Rider IDE.

AI-powered Enhancements

WPF Report Designer — AI-powered Expressions

The DevExpress WPF Report Designer will support expression generation via natural language queries, and will match the AI-powered expression capabilities already available in WinForms and Web Report Designer components. Report creators can describe the desired logic in plain text, and the AI assistant will generate the appropriate expression syntax. This update achieves AI-powered expression parity across all supported desktop and web platforms.

AI Prompt-to-Report Wizard — Optimization

We will optimize the AI Prompt-to-Report Wizard so that users can input shorter prompts and generate more consistent, production-ready report output. Our updated implementation will use a multi-agent workflow and will also reduce token consumption per report generation request.

Your Feedback Matters

WPF — Year-End Roadmap (v25.2)

Alexander Russkov (DevExpress) — Thu, 14 Aug 2025 02:05:00 Z

In this post, I'll outline WPF enhancements/features we expect to ship in our next major update (v25.2). If you'd like to share feedback about the features outlined herein, feel free to submit your thoughts/comments using the survey below or create a Support Center ticket. We’ll be happy to follow-up.

.NET 10 Support

We plan to officially support .NET 10 after its final release. If you're wondering what enhancements .NET 10 brings to the platform itself, be sure to check the following Microsoft help topic: What's new in WPF for .NET 10 Preview.

DevExpress MCP Server for AI-Powered Documentation Access

Available in Preview

We will introduce an MCP server that connects GitHub Copilot Chat, Cursor, and other MCP-compatible AI tools directly to our comprehensive documentation database. The server will provide instant access to over 300,000 help topics through natural language queries within your IDE. This will allow you and AI coding agents such as Claude Code to access current DevExpress documentation directly within the AI assistant's context.

AI Chat Control

Tool Calling API

Our new API will allow you to create tools that execute any custom commands (apply filters to Grids, modify Chart UIs, query databases, or perform business actions). With these tools, end users will be able to interact with your DevExpress-powered application directly from AI Chat using natural language.

Visual Tool Execution Indicators

Our Chat Control will provide clear visual indicators when executing AI tools, whether declared locally within your application or connected via MCP (Model Context Protocol) servers. These indicators will enhance transparency and help users understand which actions are being performed in real-time.

Resources

v25.2 will introduce a resources feature designed to attach additional context to chat messages within our Blazor AI Chat control. Unlike simple file attachments, resources can include various context types supplied by your application (binary files including audio, images and PDFs, database schemas, records, logs, and more). Users can view available resources directly in the chat input field and attach them to enhance AI interactions.

RAG Project Template

We will create a new project template based on our AI Chat Control and powered by Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG). This template will help you extract information from documents and allow an AI assistant to answer questions based on your data. It will leverage our AI Chat Control to deliver a conversational UI, and Office File API to pull data from PDF and Word documents.

DevExpress Template Kit

Rider Integration

DevExpress Template Kit includes dozens of project templates and building blocks available in Visual Studio and VS Code. With v25.2, you'll be able to use these templates in JetBrains Rider.

Item Templates

You’ll be able to use our templates when creating new apps AND in existing projects via the Add | New Item dialog. Our gallery includes almost 40 templates, including:

Kanban View
Interactive Charts
Master-detail Data Grid representations
Pre-designed editing forms
Infrastructure for MVVM and Dependency Injection
Pre-configured dashboards
Document processing functionality (Mail merge, Excel imports & generation, Word to PDF conversion and more)

Keyboard Navigation Enhancements

Chart Control

Currently, chart series and points can only be selected using a mouse - with v25.2, we'll introduce keyboard navigation support so users can interact with chart elements via a keyboard. This enhancement will be of value in dashboard-style views where chart selection affects data displayed in related components.

WPF Filter Editor & Filter Panel

You’ll be able to navigate, modify, and delete filter nodes using the keyboard. Combined with the header navigation introduced in earlier releases, this update makes all core WPF Data Grid functionality fully accessible via the keyboard.

WPF ColorEdit

You’ll be able to navigate ColorEdit elements and select colors using the keyboard.

WPF StepProgressBar

Users who prefer the use of a keyboard will be able to navigate steps without the use of a mouse.

WPF Ribbon Control

While our WPF Ribbon Control already supports keyboard navigation, in v25.2 we will extend our implementation and add support for nested RibbonControls, RibbonGallery navigation, and traversal of disabled items.

Screen Reader Support for DevExpress Office-Inspired WPF Controls

To help meet accessibility standards, we’re beginning work on screen reader support for the DevExpress WPF Rich Text Editor, Spreadsheet, and PDF Viewer (full support for all controls should be completed after our v25.2 release). As you'd expect, this capability will allow users to access document content via screen readers, such as Narrator and NVDA.

WPF Data Grid

UI Automation Enhancements

We’re adding a new event so you customize accessible information for Data Grid rows. This will be of value if using custom detail templates or when working in compact mode (where users can’t navigate through individual cells). Additionally, screen readers will be able to automatically read all the information in Data Grid rows - even when navigating by rows instead of cells.

    private void TableView_AutomationRequested(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e) {           
        switch(e) {
            case CellAutomationEventArgs cellArgs: {
                    TableView_CellAutomationRequested(sender, cellArgs);
                    break;
                }
            case RowAutomationEventArgs rowArgs: {
                    switch(rowArgs.AutomationProperty) {
                        case AutomationProperty.Name:
                            ProcessRowNameRequested(sender, rowArgs);
                            break;
                    }
                    break;
                }
            default: break;
        }
    }

Selector Column Position

Currently, the Selector Column in our WPF Data Grid l is fixed to the left side. With v25.2, you’ll be able to place the Selector Column at a desired location.

Column Print Width

v25.2 will include new APIs to define custom column width for print and export operations. You’ll no longer need to modify column width at runtime (porior to an export operation) - simply use the new PrintWidth property to control layout during print/export.

<dxg:GridControl>
    <dxg:GridControl.Columns>
        <dxg:GridColumn FieldName="Name"
                        Width="170"
                        PrintWidth="300" />
        <dxg:GridColumn FieldName="Email"
                        Width="200"
                        PrintWidth="400" />
    </dxg:GridControl.Columns>
</dxg:GridControl>

Dependency Injection Markup Extension

We will add a markup extension to assign DataContext in XAML when view models are resolved from a Dependency Injection container.

<Window ...
    xmlns:dx="https://schemas.devexpress.com/maui" 
    DataContext="{dx:Ioc Type={x:Type vm:MainViewModel}}">

public partial class App : Application {
    protected override void OnStartup(StartupEventArgs e) {
        //...
        builder.Services.AddTransient<MainViewModel>();
    }
}

With this extension, you won’t need to create a constructor in your view to pass the view model and manually assign it to DataContext:

//not required anymore
public MainWindow(MainViewModel viewModel) {
    DataContext = viewModel;
    InitializeComponent();
}

The Ioc extension will allow you to inject a view model into a view, even if the view itself isn't registered in the DI container. This will be useful when you have a UserControl embedded within a parent page in XAML.

<Window ... x:Class="MauiExample.MainPage">
    <views:ChildView/>
    <!--...-->
</Window >

<UserControl x:Class="MauiExample.Views.ChildView" 
        DataContext="{dx:Ioc Type={x:Type vm:ChildViewModel}}" >
</UserControl>

Rich Text Editor

Word to PDF/UA Conversion

With our year-end-release, DevExpress Word-processing tools will automatically add accessible tags for PDF form fields when users export Word documents with Content Controls to the PDF/UA format.

Enhanced Master-Detail Mail Merge

We will extend our Word Processing API with support for mail merge operations based on hierarchical (master-detail) data sources. This feature will allow developers to bind nested collections directly to Word templates using standard merge field syntax. With this enhancement, you will be able to:

Define repeatable detail sections using region-based merge fields.
Use a single template to generate multi-level reports, invoices, or personalized documents.
Perform complex document generation from hierarchical business objects (for example, Customer → Orders, Order → Items).
Integrate with custom data sources.

Spreadsheet Editor

Excel to PDF/UA Conversion

We’ll enhance our Excel to PDF/UA conversion engine to address accessibility issues related to graphical object tagging and artifact generation (for decorative content).

OLE Object Support Enhancements

Our next release will allow you to manage OLE Objects (load, modify, and save) in binary file formats:

XLS
XLSB

New Excel Functions

We will enhance our Spreadsheet calculation engine by adding support for modern, dynamic array-based Excel functions, including functions such as:

XLOOKUP
XMATCH
FILTER
UNIQUE
And more

Reports

Enhanced PDF Export — Accessibility Enhancements

We will extend DevExpress Reports APIs and give you granular control over PDF accessibility features. This enhancement allows developers to specify PDF layout artifacts — elements skipped by assistive technologies — and define alternative text for report watermarks.

Enhanced DOCX Export — Accessibility Enhancements

The report controls' AccessibleDescription property will be available when exporting reports to DOCX files.

Report Design Analyzer — Accessibility Checker

We will extend the Report Design Analyzer pane with a new "Accessibility" error source category to help report designers create accessible documents across multiple Microsoft Office/PDF export formats. This feature mirrors accessibility assistant functionality found in Microsoft Office products and provides proactive guidance during the design phase. As you would expect, this capability will dramatically improve accessibility compliance while reducing the learning curve for developers new to accessibility standards. This feature will also:

Enable report designers to identify and fix accessibility issues before export
Reduce accessibility violations in exported documents
Provide clear, actionable guidance for accessibility improvements
Support multiple export formats with format-specific checks

DevExpress Report Designer for JetBrains Rider

Responding to community demand and the growing popularity of JetBrains Rider, we will integrate the DevExpress Visual Studio Report Designer with JetBrains Rider. This IDE integration will allow developers to create, modify, and manage DevExpress Reports directly within their preferred IDE environment, eliminating the need to switch between development tools.

AI-Powered Enhancements

With v25.2, we plan to deliver AI-powered feature parity across DevExpress Report Designer components for all supported platforms (including our Visual Studio Report Designer). No matter which platform or IDE you use, you’ll benefit from the same AI-powered tools that accelerate report design and reduce manual effort.

For a detailed overview of AI-powered capabilities in DevExpress Reports, refer to the following: AI-powered Capabilities

End-User Report Designer — Time Range Parameter Editor

In our v25.1 release cycle, we introduced a time range (TimeOnly) parameter editor for our WinForms Report Viewer. v25.2 will introduce the same capability on all supported platforms (WPF, ASP.NET Core, Angular, React, and Blazor). As you can see below, this enhancement delivers a unified time range filtering experience across platforms (with support at both data source and report levels).

DevExpress Report Designer Data Source Wizard — Pinned Data Sources

We will enhance the "Choose a data source" page in the Data Source Wizard and allow users to pin their most frequently used database providers as favorites. These favorite providers will be displayed at the top of the list for quick access.

Time Zone Conversion

With v25.2, DevExpress Reports will convert UTC date and time values to the viewer's local time zone. This feature is essential for applications with a global user base, as it ensures that all users analyze report data in their respective local time zones.

Your Feedback Counts

If you have a specific question about our WPF roadmap, feel free to submit a support ticket via the DevExpress Support Center. We will be happy to follow-up.

WPF — Early Access Preview (v25.1)

Alexander Russkov (DevExpress) — Fri, 11 Apr 2025 10:15:00 Z

Our next major update (v25.1) is a couple of months away. In this post, I'll summarize some of the features/capabilities available in our early access (EAP) build.

All active DevExpress Universal and DXperience subscribers can download and install the EAP today. Please navigate to the DevExpress Download Manager to obtain our EAP build.

Early Access and CTP builds are provided solely for early testing purposes and are not ready for production use. This build can be installed side by side with other major versions of DevExpress products. Please backup your project and other important data before installing Early Access and CTP builds.

This EAP may not include all features/products we expect to ship in our v25.1 release cycle. As its name implies, the EAP offers an early preview of what we expect to ship in two months. For additional information on what you can expect, refer to our June 2025 Roadmap (v25.1).

DevExpress WPF Template Kit (Discussion)

Our new templates allow you to quickly create WPF projects with optimized architecture/design. You can configure new projects by selecting a navigation type and a set of pre-designed views. DevExpress WPF Templates include the following options/capabilities:

4 navigation types: Accordion, Accordion with Tabbed Documents, Tabbed Window, and Compact Panel (Teams/Outlook-like).
30+ pre-designed views (you can select multiple views simultaneously).
Performance optimizations, including Lightweight themes, resource preloading, Multi-Core JIT, and ReadyToRun deployment.
MVVM and Dependency Injection patterns.
Infrastructure for asynchronous data loading and command execution.
Server-side support, including OData, authentication, and permission management.

Our WPF Templates will be available through Visual Studio and VS Code extensions. Though we're still working on the extensions, you can already use the CLI templates shared in the feature discussion thread. Here are some of the views and modules we’ve implemented.

Kanban Board – manage workflows by moving cards between groups, creating new items, and checking completed tasks. The Kanban board is powered by our Data Grid with a custom row template.

Middle-tier module – With this additional layer of protection (authentication, authorization, and encryption), desktop UI clients will not be able to access database connection information or modify database tables directly. You will be able to maintain an existing data context (DbContext) and business logic while establishing remote/secure connections to an RDBMS–based data store.

Employee Editing Form – A view with pre-configured editors arranged using the DevExpress Layout Control. We’ve implemented a classic editing form and a version with embedded labels.

Avalonia XPF (Discussion)

As you may know, Avalonia XPF allows WPF projects to run on macOS and Linux. The Avalonia team has added support for DevExpress controls. We migrated some of our demos to this technology to help you evaluate whether Avalonia XPF meets your cross-platform development needs.

Important considerations:

Avalonia XPF was not developed by DevExpress. Support for DevExpress controls is managed by the Avalonia team. You can find a list of known limitations here: Supported DevExpress Components

Avalonia XPF is different from Avalonia UI. While Avalonia XPF enables WPF applications to run on macOS and Linux, Avalonia UI is a separate framework for building cross-platform apps from the ground-up. DevExpress components do not support Avalonia UI.

Windows 11 System Accent Colors

To maintain visual consistency between your app and the operating system, our Win11 Lightweight themes can automatically select accent color based on a user's system settings. To enable this capability, set CompatibilitySettings.UseLightweightThemes to true and assign the ApplicationThemeHelper.ApplicationThemeName property:

CompatibilitySettings.UseLightweightThemes = true;
ApplicationThemeHelper.ApplicationThemeName = LightweightTheme.Win11SystemColors.Name;

Lightweight Themes - Set Theme-Specific Values in XAML

Our new LWThemeValue markup extension helps you design your views for multiple DevExpress themes. LWThemeValue allows you to set a property based on the current theme in XAML. You can assign it a specific value or a static resource.

<Window.Resources> 
    <SolidColorBrush x:Key="office2019Color" Color="Green"/> 
    <SolidColorBrush x:Key="win11Color" Color="Red"/> 
</Window.Resources> 

<Border Margin="{LWThemeValue Office2019='0,0,0,0', Win11='8,8,8,8'}" 
    CornerRadius="{LWThemeValue Office2019=0, Win11=4}" 
    BorderBrush="{LWThemeValue Office2019={StaticResource office2019Color}, Win11={StaticResource win11Color}}" 
    BorderThickness="1"> 
    <!--...--> 
</Border>

If you have multiple theme-dependent resources, you can group them into dictionaries and dynamically apply them using the LWThemeDictionary extension.

<!-- Dictionary1.xaml --> 
<ResourceDictionary ...> 
    <SolidColorBrush x:Key="myBrush">Red</SolidColorBrush> 
</ResourceDictionary> 

<!-- Dictionary2.xaml --> 
<ResourceDictionary ...> 
    <SolidColorBrush x:Key="myBrush">Blue</SolidColorBrush> 
</ResourceDictionary> 

<UserControl ...> 
    <UserControl.Resources> 
        <LWThemeDictionary Default="Resources/Dictionary1.xaml" Win11="Resources/Dictionary2.xaml"> 
    </UserControl.Resources> 
    <Border Background="{DynamicResource myBrush}"/> 
</UserControl>

AI Enhancements (Discussion)

Semantic Search (Data Grid)

We implemented Semantic Search in our WPF Data Grid to help you locate items based on meaning rather than an exact match. For instance, if your Data Grid contains CV info, and users search for "developers with AI experience", Semantic Search will include results for terms such as "machine learning", "deep learning" or "neural networks" (even if "AI" isn’t explicitly mentioned).

Smart Search (Ribbon & Accordion)

DevExpress WPF Ribbon and Accordion controls now support AI-powered search. Smart Search works alongside traditional search algorithms to deliver a more powerful and user-friendly search experience.

When a user pauses text entry in the search field (within the Ribbon or Accordion control), the control sends the current search query to an AI service that understands context, synonyms, and user intent beyond exact keyword matches. Once the AI service returns results, the control filters items accordingly.

Smart Paste (Data Grid & Layout Control)

We added Smart Paste operations to our WPF Data Grid and Layout Control. Smart Paste is an AI-ready feature that transforms traditional copy-paste operations. Designed to improve productivity, Smart Paste analyses copied content and intelligently assigns correct values to appropriate fields/row cells in the DevExpress Data Grid and Layout Control-powered forms.

WPF Ribbon Backstage Navigation

We implemented keyboard navigation support in our WPF Ribbon Backstage View (allows users to interact with Backstage elements without a mouse).

WPF DateNavigator and DateEdit Navigation

DateNavigator and DateEdit now support keyboard navigation for all UI elements. When DateEdit is focused, press Alt + Down to open the popup, then use the Down arrow to focus on the date area. You can navigate through dates using the arrow keys, Shift + Tab to focus the header, and Tab to move between the Today and Close buttons.

Performance

A few releases ago, we introduced Lightweight (LW) Themes, which significantly reduce view load time and memory consumption. In v25.1, we’ve reworked our Demo Center modules to help you evaluate performance improvements across our controls.

These optimizations were made possible by the use of Lightweight Themes, resource preloading, and demo refactoring.

Increase WPF App Performance with Lightweight DevExpress Themes

Alexander Russkov (DevExpress) — Wed, 26 Feb 2025 01:04:00 Z

What if your next DevExpress-powered (classic theme based) WPF application loaded nearly twice as fast? And what if I told you that you could achieve this very thing with a simple theme change?

By switching from classic DevExpress themes to lightweight DevExpress WPF themes, you can improve startup speed, reduce memory consumption, and enhance overall responsiveness. In this post, I’ll outline the benefits of lightweight themes and key factors to consider when updating your app. With that brief teaser, let's dig into the details and show you how to incorporate lightweight WPF themes in your project...

Application Startup

As you may know, we introduced lightweight themes in our v23.2 release cycle. When compared to classic themes in v23.1, lightweight themes offer the following startup performance improvements:

Note: Actual performance gains will vary based on .NET version, whether Ngen or ReadyToRun is used, and other app-specific factors. We’ve uploaded additional benchmark data in the following GitHub repository: WPF Lightweight Themes - Performance Tests.

To achieve these improvements, we overhauled our WPF theme implementation and included the following optimizations:

Restructured resource dictionaries to reduce search depth.
Removed unnecessary parts of the default DeepBlue theme.
Reorganized theme keys to use fewer classes and reduce JIT compilation.
Enhanced caching for images loaded from the DevExpress.Images library.

These enhancements reduce the time associated with JIT initialization, XAML parsing, and resource loading (to reduce startup time even further, consider enabling Multi-Core JIT and ReadyToRun in your app. I discussed these techniques in the following blog post: 9 Tips to Reduce WPF App Startup Time).

View Switching

In addition to startup time, lightweight theme optimizations helped improve view switching performance. As you'd expect, users can now interact with our UI controls more quickly when they open a view for the second time.

With this change, you can expect faster tab switching, navigation, panel docking/undocking, and enhanced app responsiveness.

Memory Usage

Because we now use fewer XAML resources, lightweight themes consume less memory (both RAM and local disk usage).

Effective memory management helps reduce performance issues and reduce power consumption on devices such as laptops. This fact is especially important on older devices, where the OS can create swap files on the local disk when RAM is insufficient.

Since all lightweight themes share multiple XAML resources, we combined them into a single assembly that only requires 11 MB of space (compared to 10 assemblies totaling 72 MB in a similar set of classic themes).

Simplified Access to Palette Colors

In addition to performance and memory enhancements, lightweight themes simplify palette color usage. To reference a theme color in your app, simply specify the color name in the ThemeResource extension:

<Border BorderBrush="{dxci:ThemeResource ThemeKey='Brush.Border'}"/>

You can also specify different colors based on the currently applied theme:

<Border BorderBrush="{dxci:ThemeResource ThemeKey='Brush.Border, 
                     Win11Light=Brush.Custom.Red'}" />

By referencing default colors, you can synch the appearance of DevExpress/other UI elements in your app.

Upgrade Path to Lightweight Themes

To activate lightweight themes, add the DevExpress.Wpf.ThemesLW package and invoke the following code during application startup:

CompatibilitySettings.UseLightweightThemes = true;
ApplicationThemeHelper.ApplicationThemeName = LightweightTheme.Win11Light.Name;

If you’ve customized classic themes, note the following:

Lightweight themes do not support the DevExpress WPF Theme Designer. If you mainly used the Theme Designer for color customization, you can override colors using custom palettes. This technique allows you to specify most theme colors without building a new assembly. For more complex customizations, you can use built-in control APIs or modify theme resources.
Lightweight theme resources have different key names compared to classic themes. If you’ve overridden classic resources in your app, most of them should work for lightweight themes, but minor modifications may be necessary. For example, the ThemeName attribute won’t work with old theme keys. We’ve described these differences in the following help topic: Modify Lightweight Theme Resources.

Switching to lightweight themes should be straightforward. However, even if you choose to stay with classic themes, consider upgrading to v23.2 or newer, as this version improves performance in classic themes as well. You can expect up to a 30% startup performance improvement compared to v23.1.

Future Updates

We will continue working on performance enhancements in future release cycles (we expect to optimize font loading performance within the WPF Rich Text and Font Editors in our v25.1 release cycle). Additionally, we've reduced view load time and memory consumption in our demos to help you better evaluate performance improvements across our controls. If you encounter any challenges when using lightweight WPF themes, feel free to create a DevExpress Support Center ticket - we'll be happy to follow up.

And one more reminder - don't forget to check out my other WPF performance-related blog post: 9 Tips to Reduce WPF App Startup Time.

WPF — June 2025 Roadmap (v25.1)

Alexander Russkov (DevExpress) — Wed, 19 Feb 2025 02:00:00 Z

In this blog post, I’ll highlight WPF-related features/capabilities we expect to ship in our upcoming mid-year release (v25.1). As you'll note below, key focus areas will be Artificial Intelligence, Accessibility, and streamlined project setup. A few features in this post include links to DevExpress Support Center discussions - we invite you to join the conversation and help shape our mid-year release. As always, we appreciate your input.

Drag & Drop & Clipboard Operations in .NET 9

As you may know, Microsoft removed BinaryFormatter from .NET 9 for security reasons. Since standard drag & drop functionality relied on BinaryFormatter to serialize custom objects, we disabled cross-application drag & drop for some WPF controls in our v24.2 release cycle. You can still pass data to drag & drop as a simple type (such as a JSON-formatted string), but this requires additional project logic.

We will simplify drag & drop and clipboard operations for those usage scenarios that previously relied on BinaryFormatter. Given the importance of this functionality, we’ll evaluate potential changes for those using v24.2 as well.

For additional information on BinaryFormatter-related changes, refer to the following thread: Component functionality changes due to BinaryFormatter deprecation.

.NET Upgrade Assistant Integration for Project Upgrades (Discussion)

We expect to ship a new plugin (VSIX) for Microsoft's .NET Upgrade Assistant. We expect this plugin to ultimately replace the DevExpress Project Converter for .NET 8+ projects. Benefits will include the following:

The .NET Upgrade Assistant allows us to support more IDEs and operating systems, as it is available in Visual Studio Code for Windows, Mac, and Linux. The upgrade process is simpler and streamlined because we will maintain less code across versions (in the future, we will only offer the DevExpress Project Converter for .NET Framework projects).
Unlike our Project Converter, the new plugin will have access to NuGet, Roslyn, MEF, and other IDE services. With the .NET Upgrade Assistant's auto–fix capabilities, we can automatically detect and safely resolve breaking changes in DevExpress code. This includes but is not limited to obsolete code replacements (such as, Font > DXFont, DxPivotGrid > DxPivotTable, etc.).
We will deliver the new plugin for minor and major DevExpress versions. The plugin will include the most recent Directory.Packages.props file updates (with DevExpress–compatible 3rd party dependencies for CPM). You will be able to update all project dependencies and resolve security vulnerabilities with a single click.

Our Unified Component Installer will automatically install the new plug–in. The plugin will also be able for download from the Visual Studio Marketplace, nuget.org, and nuget.devexpress.com.

DevExpress Template Kit (Discussion)

Our new Template Kit will make it easier to create projects for a variety of usage scenarios. With v25.1, you will be able to configure new projects by selecting navigation type and a set of pre-designed views. Here’s an image demonstrating our implementation in .NET MAUI:

You’ll also be able to add view templates to existing projects.

Our Template Kit will include a new project template to create a WPF application with a secured data layer powered by ASP.NET Core WebAPI, EF Core, and Middle–Tier Application Server*. With this additional layer of protection (authentication, authorization, and encryption), desktop UI clients will not be able to access database connection information or modify database tables directly. Developers will be able to maintain an existing data context (DbContext) and business logic while establishing remote/secure connections to an RDBMS–based data store.

* Ships as part of the DevExpress XAF (Cross–Platform .NET App UI). An Active DevExpress Universal subscription is required to use this capability.

Currently, the DevExpress Template Kit is available for Visual Studio and VS Code.

Avalonia XPF (Discussion)

As you may know, Avalonia XPF allows WPF projects to run on macOS and Linux. The Avalonia team has added support for DevExpress controls. We expect to migrate some of our demos to this technology to help you evaluate whether Avalonia XPF meets your cross-platform development needs.

Important considerations:

Avalonia XPF was not developed by DevExpress. Support for DevExpress controls is managed by the Avalonia team. You can find a list of known limitations here: Supported DevExpress Components
Avalonia XPF is different from Avalonia UI. While Avalonia XPF enables WPF applications to run on macOS and Linux, Avalonia UI is a separate framework for building cross-platform apps from the ground-up. DevExpress components do not support Avalonia UI.

Accessibility Enhancements (Discussion)

Keyboard Navigation

We continue to enhance accessibility across all DevExpress UI controls. In v25.1, we expect to improve accessibility for our Property Grid, Backstage View, and Editors.

Screen Reader & UI Automation

We expect to enhance the UI Automation tree for Screen readers (Narrator, NVDA) and UI Automation tests. You will be able to retrieve more information about element state and structure (such as selection status and node levels). This will make it easier for visually impaired users to interact with your applications.

AI Enhancements (Discussion)

New AI Chat Control

We will create a new WPF AI Control to help you introduce AI agents into your DevExpress-powered WPF application. This chat component will be based on our Blazor AI Chat control (DxAIChat). While we will use Blazor Hybrid, native WPF APIs will allow you to use the component in XAML just like any other native control.

At present, you can incorporate the DevExpress Blazor AI Chat into your WPF application as follows: Blazor AI Chat - How to add the DevExpress Blazor AI Chat component to your next Blazor, MAUI, WPF, and WinForms application.

Smart Paste (Data Grid & Layout Control)

With v25.1, we will add Smart Paste operations to our WPF Data Grid and Layout Control. Smart Paste is an AI-ready feature that transforms traditional copy-paste operations. Designed to improve productivity, Smart Paste analyses copied content and intelligently assigns correct values to appropriate fields/row cells in the DevExpress Data Grid and Layout Control-powered forms.

When Smart Paste is activated, the "Smart Paste" command will be automatically added to a control's popup menu. When a user copies data from a source (such as a spreadsheet, document, or web page) and pastes it into a Data Grid or Layout Control-powered form, Smart Paste will automatically interpret content and map data to correct data fields or cells.

Smart Search (Ribbon & Accordion)

DevExpress WPF Ribbon and Accordion controls will support AI-powered search. Smart Search will work alongside traditional search algorithms to deliver a more powerful and user-friendly search experience.

When a user pauses text entry in the search field (within the Ribbon or Accordion control), the control will send the current search query to an AI service that understands context, synonyms, and user intent beyond exact keyword matches. Once the AI service returns results, the control filters items accordingly.

Semantic Search (Data Grid)

We will implement Semantic Search in our WPF Data Grid to help you locate items based on meaning rather than an exact match. For instance, if your Data Grid contains CV info, and users search for "developers with AI experience", Semantic Search will include results for terms such as "machine learning", "deep learning" or "neural networks" (even if "AI" isn’t explicitly mentioned).

Smart Actions (PDF Viewer)

We will integrate AI-powered features into our WPF PDF Viewer component. These enhancements will allow users to quickly understand the underlying essence of individual documents via Generative AI summaries and translate documents to a preferred language using AI-powered translations.
Additionally, users will be able to interact with an AI-powered assistant directly within their applications and ask questions about PDF documents.

Note: Our implementation is based on the functionality provided by the Microsoft.Extensions.AI library. To access these features, you will need to register the IChatClient implementation in your app (based on the desired AI services provider: OpenAI, Azure Open AI, Google Gemini or local open-source models powered by Ollama).

Performance in Demos

A few releases ago, we introduced Lightweight (LW) Themes, which significantly reduce view load time and memory consumption. In v25.1, we’ve reworked our Demo Center modules to help you better evaluate the performance improvements across our controls.

These optimizations were made possible by Lightweight Themes, a resource preloading mechanism, and demo refactoring.

Data Grid Enhancements (Discussion)

Grid Column Print Width

You will be able to set the width of printed/exported columns with dedicated properties. This will allow you to control printed column width without changing column width in your actual Data Grid.

Tree View Customization Settings

We're adding more APIs to simplify configuration of the internal TreeListView used in our TreeViewControl. Based on your feedback in the Support Center, we’ll introduce new APIs at the TreeViewControl level to streamline customization.

Column-Specific Button Visibility and Posting Mode

DevExpress Data Grid allows you to customize the following behaviors:

Editor button visibility - Always visible, in a focused cell/row, or only in an active editor (EditorButtonShowMode).
Data posting behavior - Update the data source when a user leaves a cell or as they type (EnableImmediatePosting).

At present, these settings apply to the Data Grid as a whole. Based on your feedback in Support Center, we’ll introduce per-column support for more granular control.

Reporting

Improved Label and Table Cell Text Formatting (Discussion)

Our next release will allow users to define line spacing for displayed text/values within the DevExpress Report Designer. This feature will enhance readability and provide greater control over individual report layouts. Users can directly modify line spacing for basic report controls to improve multi-line text clarity and reduce the memory footprint associated with the XRRichText control.

Time Zone Conversion (Discussion)

With v25.1, DevExpress Reports will be able to convert UTC date and time values to the viewer's local time zone. This feature is essential for applications with a global user base, as it ensures that all users analyze report data in their respective local time zones.

Spreadsheet Control

OLE Objects

Spreadsheet components will support embedded and linked objects (OLE objects) within Excel documents. You will be able to import and save documents with OLE Objects to supported Excel formats without content loss. OLE Object icons will be properly displayed when you preview the document, print, or export it to PDF.
Additionally, we’ll introduce APIs to create, remove, and manage OLE objects in code.

New Excel Functions Support

We will enhance our Spreadsheet calculation engine by adding support for modern, dynamic array-based Excel functions. In v25.1, we will introduce functions like:

XLOOKUP
XMATCH
UNIQUE
And more

These functions will improve data lookup, filtering, and transformation capabilities across our Spreadsheet components.

Rich Text Editor

CJK (Chinese, Japanese and Korean) Text Wrapping

To enhance document rendering and readability, our Word Processing library and Rich Text Editors will support CJK text wrapping and line breaking rules. This feature applies correct line breaks between characters for Chinese, Japanese, and Korean (CJK) text. Documents using these wrapping rules will be displayed, printed, and exported to PDF with appropriate formatting.

RTL (Right-to-Left) Engine Enhancements

In our mid-year release v25.1, we will extend our RTL rendering engine for Rich Text components. This functionality will ensure correct rendering and PDF export for document paragraphs, tables and shapes containing bi-directional text (mixed Right-to-Left and Left-to-Right text blocks).

Export Word Content Controls to PDF AcroForm Fields

We will enhance our Word-to-PDF export engine and support the conversion of Word content controls into PDF AcroForm fields. With this capability, you'll be able to import or generate Word documents with content controls in our Rich Text document editing tools, export these documents to PDF, and automatically generate corresponding AcroForm fields in PDF output. This feature will apply to the following content control types:

Plain Text Boxes
Check Boxes
Popupfds

New PowerPoint API Presentation Library

We expect to extend the capabilities of the DevExpress Office File API library with a new Presentation library for .NET.

This non-visual library will allow developers to generate, modify, print, and export PowerPoint presentations to different formats in code. We expect to support the following PowerPoint-related usage scenarios programmatically:

Create new presentations from scratch.
Save presentations using the PPTX (OpenXml) document format.
Merge multiple presentations into a single file.
Add, remove, and extract presentation slides; modify slide settings.
Add, remove, and customize slide elements (shapes, texts, tables and more).
Apply formatting to slide elements.
Print and export presentations to PDF.

Note: The CTP (Community Technology Preview) version of our PowerPoint Presentation Library is expected mid-year. As in any CTP, functional limitations will apply.

*Usage requires one of the following subscriptions: Office File API, Universal

PDF Document API

PDF Document Compression

To reduce file size when saving PDF documents using DevExpress PDF Document APIs, we will introduce a compression engine for the PDF object streams. This engine will optimize PDFs for more efficient storage/sharing options. New compression mechanisms will apply to various document structures, including PDF forms, fonts, and graphics.

*Usage requires one of the following subscriptions: Office File API, Universal

Redaction API

We’ll introduce a new Redaction API that allows users to secure PDF documents and permanently remove sensitive information. This feature will allow you to:

Erase personal or confidential data from a PDF document and prevent end-users from accessing, viewing or copying it.
Apply overlays with custom text or graphics over redacted areas.

*Usage requires one of the following subscriptions: Office File API, Universal

Word Processing Document API

Compare Word Documents

We will introduce new APIs to compare Word documents. This capability will allow you to:

Identify changes between two document versions.
Generate revision-based output highlighting.

Note: These new APIs will focus on detecting changes and making revisions for the visible document content only.

*Usage requires one of the following subscriptions: Office File API, Universal

WPF — Early Access Preview (v24.2)

Alexander Russkov (DevExpress) — Mon, 23 Sep 2024 03:00:00 Z

In this post, I’ll highlight WPF-related features we expect to include in our Early Access Preview (EAP v24.2) build. All active DevExpress Universal and DXperience subscribers can download and install the EAP today. Please navigate to the DevExpress Download Manager to obtain our EAP build.

Early Access and CTP builds are provided solely for early testing purposes and are not ready for production use. This build can be installed side by side with other major versions of DevExpress products. Please back up your project and other important data before installing Early Access and CTP builds.

This EAP may not include all features/products we expect to ship in our v24.1 release cycle. As its name implies, the EAP offers an early preview of what we expect to ship in two months. For additional information on what you can expect, refer to our Year-End 2024.2 Roadmap.

.NET 9 Support

The DevExpress WPF product line now supports NET 9 RC1.

.NET 8, .NET Framework 4.6.2, Visual Studio 2019 Will Be Minimally Supported Versions for DevExpress Libraries (v24.2+)

Learn more about this global change in this announcement.

Easier Upgrade to .NET from .NET Framework

Our Project Converter can now convert DevExpress assembly references in your solution or specific project to corresponding DevExpress NuGet packages. By selecting the "Convert DevExpress assembly references to NuGet packages" option under Advanced settings, you can easily transition to NuGet-based project management.

To streamline the upgrade process, our Project Converter automatically creates backup (.bak) files for your CSPROJ and VBPROJ files. Once DevExpress assemblies are converted, complete the upgrade process by using Microsoft .NET Upgrade Assistant (to migrate your application to the most recent version of .NET).

DateOnly & TimeOnly Support

We've enhanced DateOnly & TimeOnly support throughout our WPF product line. Key features available in our EAP build include the following:

WPF Grid Control – TimeOnly Column Filters

Our Data Grid now features enhanced quick filters for TimeOnly values within the Excel Column Filter. To use these filters, open the column filter popup, go to the Filter Rules tab, and select Time Intervals.

WPF Grid Control – TimeOnly Seconds Rounding

To simplify filtering, our WPF Grid control now automatically rounds TimeOnly values to the nearest minute. If your data contains TimeOnly values that only differ in seconds or milliseconds, these values will be combined into a single filtering entity. On the UI side, we’ve simplified interval-based criteria (to improve usability) within both the Filter Panel and AutoFilter Row.

PropertyGrid – DateOnly & TimeOnly Support

Our WPF Property Grid can now automatically generate an editor (with appropriate settings) when an edited object uses DateOnly or TimeOnly properties.

New TimeOnly Functions

This EAP adds new TimeOnly-specific criteria functions to our criteria language and Grid-based UI controls (Data Grid, TreeList, PropertyGrid).

New TimeOnly functions include:

BeforeMidday - Filters records that occur before 12:00 PM.
AfterMidday - Filters records that occur after 12:00 PM.
ThisHour - Filters records that occur during the current hour.
NextHour - Filters records that occur during the next hour.
LastHour - Filters records that occurred during the previous hour.
IsMorning - Filters records that occur between 6:00 AM and 12:00 PM.
IsAfternoon - Filters records that occur between 12:00 PM and 6:00 PM.
IsEvening - Filters records that occur between 6:00 PM and 9:00 PM.
IsNight - Filters records that occur between 9:00 PM and 6:00 AM.
IsWorkTime - Filters records that occur during work hours (9:00 AM to 5:00 PM).
IsFreeTime - Filters records that occur outside of work hours (9:00 AM to 5:00 PM).
IsLunchTime - Filters records that occur during lunch time (12:00 PM to 1:00 PM).
IsSameHour - Filters records that occur exactly at the specified hour (e.g., 2 PM).
IsSameMinute - Filters records that occur exactly at the specified hour and minute (2:35 PM).
TimeOnlyFromParts - Returns the time value for the specified time with a specified precision (hour, minute, [seconds], [milliseconds]).

Applies to:

Criteria Operators
Filtering UI (Column Filter Popup, Filter Editor)
Expression Editor
Conditional Formatting Rules
Unbound Columns

You can use these new TimeOnly functions in your DevExpress-powered .NET and .NET Framework WPF applications.

Documentation

Keyboard Navigation & Screen Reader Enhancements

The following section includes accessibility-related enhancements shipping in our EAP build.

ButtonEdit – Focus Editor Buttons

You can now focus buttons within ButtonEdit descendants and trigger associated actions. To enable this option, set ButtonEdit.AllowFocusEditorButtons to true.

RatingEdit – Changing Values With Arrows

RatingEdit allows you to modify the current value with arrow keys. Once a value is modified, it will be pronounced by a screen reader.

Card View – Expand & Collapse Shortcuts

We added Ctrl + Plus & Ctrl + Minus shortcuts to expand/collapse cards within our WPF Card View.

Column Chooser – Keyboard Navigation

Our Data Grid Column Chooser now supports keyboard navigation, allowing you to select/deselect columns with the Space key.

ImageEdit – Toolbox Button Navigation

Users can now navigate through toolbar buttons within the ImageEdit and trigger associated actions using the keyboard.

HyperLinkEdit – Visible Focus State

Previously, HyperLinkEdit did not display a visual change when focused. Users can now see when the control is focused and activate the associated action with the Space key

Data Grid – Screen Reader Enhancements

The DevExpress WPF Data Grid ships with enhanced assistive technologies support (such as screen readers). Our EAP build supports the following new capabilities:

Update buttons in Edit Entire Row mode are now detectable and readable by screen readers (you can display these buttons by enabling the TableView.ShowUpdateRowButtons option).
Alt text for images exported to Excel. As you know, in our previous update, we added in-place image Excel export support. This EAP extends the XlsExportOptionsEx.CustomizeCell event, allowing you to set alt text for exported images.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) Integration

DevExpress AI-powered APIs allow you to integrate the following AI services into your DevExpress-powered WPF application:

OpenAI
Azure OpenAI
Ollama

AI services and DevExpress AI extensions (behaviors) follow a "bring your own key" approach. DevExpress does not provide a REST API or include built-in LLMs/SLMs. To use AI services, you need an active Azure/OpenAI subscription to obtain the necessary REST API endpoint, key, and model deployment name. This information must be provided at application startup to register AI clients and enable DevExpress AI-powered features in your WPF application.

The following code snippet registers an Azure OpenAI client:

public partial class App : Application {
    public App() {
        //..
        AIExtensionsContainerDesktop.Default.RegisterChatClientOpenAIService(
            new AzureOpenAIClient(
                        new Uri("AZURE ENDPOINT"),
                        new System.ClientModel.ApiKeyCredential("YOUR API KEY")),
                        "DEPLOYMENT NAME");
    }
}

AI-driven Text Processing

NLP-powered text transform extensions (behaviors) allow you to enhance the way users interact with and manage text content. These extensions leverage advanced natural language processing (NLP) technologies to provide automated, intelligent text manipulation capabilities directly within your DevExpress-powered WPF application.

AI-powered text transform extensions include:

Expand
Explain
Explain Formular (in the Spreadsheet control)
Shorten
Summarize
Adjust Tone
Proofread
Rewrite
Translate
Ask AI (Custom Prompt)

AI-powered text transform extensions can be used in the following DevExpress WPF controls:

MemoEdit
Rich Text Editor
Spreadsheet

Each AI transform extension is enabled by a separate behavior (allowing you to include transforms extensions appropriate to your specific usage scenario):

xmlns:dxmvvm="http://schemas.devexpress.com/winfx/2008/xaml/mvvm"
xmlns:dxre="http://schemas.devexpress.com/winfx/2008/xaml/richedit"
xmlns:wpfo="clr-namespace:DevExpress.AIIntegration.Wpf.Office;assembly=DevExpress.AIIntegration.Wpf.v24.2"
xmlns:desktop="clr-namespace:DevExpress.AIIntegration.Desktop;assembly=DevExpress.AIIntegration.Desktop.v24.2"

<dxre:RichEditControl>
   <dxmvvm:Interaction.Behaviors>
      <wpfo:RichEditExpandBehavior />
      <wpfo:RichEditShortenBehavior />
      <wpfo:RichEditSummarizeBehavior />
      <wpfo:RichEditExplainBehavior />
      <wpfo:RichEditToneStyleBehavior />
      <wpfo:RichEditProofreadBehavior />
      <wpfo:RichEditRewriteStyleBehavior />
      <wpfo:RichEditTranslateBehavior >
          <desktop:LanguageInfo Culture="de-DE"/>
      </wpfo:RichEditTranslateBehavior>
      <wpfo:RichEditCustomRequestBehavior />
      <wpfo:RichEditGenerateDescriptionBehavior/>
   </dxmvvm:Interaction.Behaviors>
</dxre:RichEditControl>

Run the application, select text, invoke the popup menu, and click the desired AI-related command. AI processes the command and generates an answer. The AI-generated answer is displayed within a dialog.

You can insert the answer directly into a document or text field with a single click. You can insert the answer above/below selected text or cursor, replace all content or selected text, or copy the answer to the clipboard.

RichEditCustomRequestBehavior displays the "Ask AI" item in the context menu. The "Ask AI" item invokes a dialog that allows users to interact with an AI-powered assistant directly within your WPF application. A user can enter a question or prompt. The AI assistant will process the query and generate an answer.

Rich Text Editor & Spreadsheet – Alt Text dialogs

We've added new AI-Powered Alt Text dialogs for our WPF Rich Text Editor and Spreadsheet Control.

The Alt Text dialog allows you to set accessible descriptions for shape objects used within Word and Excel documents or mark non-informative document graphics as Decorative (this setting allows screen readers to ignore decorative graphics when scanning documents).

In addition, you can use the Alt Text dialog to generate the meaningful descriptions for document images using the power of the AI behavior.

To activate this capability in the DevExpresss WPF Rich Edit Control, add RichEditGenerateDescriptionBehavior to the Behaviors collection. For the DevExpress WPF Spreadsheet Control, use SpreadsheetGenerateDescriptionBehavior.

<dxre:RichEditControl>
    <dxmvvm:Interaction.Behaviors>
        <wpfo:RichEditGenerateDescriptionBehavior/>
    </dxmvvm:Interaction.Behaviors>
</dxre:RichEditControl>

Data Grid – Batch Editing

As you may know, Microsoft Excel allows you to select multiple cells and apply text changes by pressing Ctrl + Enter (instead of Enter). We added a similar feature to our WPF Grid control, allowing users to apply identical values to multiple cells simultaneously. To enable this functionality, set GridControl.SelectionMode to Cell and GridControl.BachEditMode to FocusedColumn/AllColumns.

Environment Policy

We added a new Environment Policy that allows you to apply global environment access restrictions, track app-initiated requests (initiated by a DevExpress UI control) and execute custom actions in response.

You can apply global restrictions using various methods like SuppressAll() to block all environment access or more specific options such as preventing DevExpress UI controls from reading or writing environment variables, exiting processes, altering the current directory, or reading paths to system special folders.

Event handlers allow you to track and manage environment-related operations. For example, you can detect when DevExpress UI controls attempt to read or modify environment variables, process data, or system directories and enable conditional responses based on specific conditions.

Documentation

Registry Access Policy

DevExpress UI controls can save, read, and modify configuration settings and options in the system registry. These requests can be initiated in code or through the internal control engine. The Registry Access Policy allows you to apply global registry access restrictions, track user/app-initiated requests, and execute custom actions in response.

Documentation

Your Feedback Matters

WPF — Year-End Roadmap (v24.2)

Kseniya Kuzmina (DevExpress) — Mon, 29 Jul 2024 05:04:00 Z

In this post, I'll outline WPF capabilities/features we expect to ship in our next major update (v24.2) including focus in the following areas:

Accessibility
AI
DateOnly & TimeOnly support

As always, we welcome your feedback. If you have questions or suggestions, feel free to submit your thoughts using the survey at the end of this post.

.NET Core / .NET

.NET 9 Support

We will support .NET 9 across our WPF product line (v24.2 and v24.1) after November 2024. Currently, we support the most recent .NET 9 preview builds for those using v24.1 (early adopter testing).

.NET 8, .NET Framework 4.6.2, Visual Studio 2019 Will Be Minimally Supported Versions for DevExpress Libraries (v24.2+)

Learn more about this global change in this announcement.

Source Code Builder Enhancements

In v24.2, we will simplify procedures used to rebuild assemblies from source code:

Our source builder tool will ship in the DevExpress Unified Component Installer.
Our source builder tool will be more stable (we added more internal tests for the rebuild process on our build farm) and will require fewer steps to initiate/complete source rebuild.
It will be easier to rebuild .NET Core/.NET projects (currently, it is a manual process) and generate the corresponding NuGet packages (including the localization packages).

Easier Upgrade to .NET from .NET Framework

We expect to improve integration with Microsoft's .NET Upgrade Assistant Tool. We also expect to offer predefined mappings for appropriate DevExpress packages (allowing Microsoft's tool to map DevExpress assembly references to corresponding DevExpress NuGet package references). If .NET Upgrade Assistant Tool mappings fail to meet our expectations, we will make necessary changes to the DevExpress Project Converter instead. NOTE: We will remove the old DevExpress .NET Core Migration Tool in our v24.2 release cycle (because of the aforementioned changes).

WPF Accessibility — Keyboard Navigation and Automation

We will extend our WPF product library with the following accessibility-related enhancements:

Keyboard navigation. End users will be able to execute additional actions without relying on a pointing device.
UI Automation and Screen Readers. We'll enhance the automation tree used by screen readers (Narrator, NonVisual Desktop Access, etc) to assist visually impaired end users. This improvement will also benefit UI testing frameworks, allowing for more comprehensive UI tests.

WPF AI-related Capabilities

We expect to introduce multiple features to help you seamlessly incorporate AI capabilities into your DevExpress-powered WPF apps. In addition to UI enhancements, we will ship an integration library for popular AI services such as OpenAI, Azure, and Ollama.

While final capabilities will depend on our ongoing research, here are some of the AI features you can expect in our next major release:

Memo Editor — Text Predictions

You will be able to display smart text suggestions in our Memo Edit control. Pressing the Tab key will apply a suggestion, allowing users to enter information faster, avoid spelling errors, etc.

AI Assistant Menu

We will introduce a menu with smart action support across our text-based UI controls. Here are some of the actions you can expect in our v24.2 release cycle:

Rewrite
Summarize
Shorten
Expand
Proofread
Fix Spelling
Translate

These actions will be applicable to either a single word, selected text, or to entire text blocks.

Smart Search (Semantic Similarity)

When users search for specific text, they may not know its exact representation within the database or UI. While tags can be used to improve search operations, populating and maintaining them can be time-consuming, especially if using dynamic data.

v24.2 will include APIs to help you incorporate smart search capabilities when using DevExpress WPF controls.

DateOnly & TimeOnly Enhancements

As you may know, .NET 6 introduced DateOnly and TimeOnly types to better handle date/time values (when compared to the DateTime struct). We will continue integrating features related to both, ensuring seamless use of DateOnly and TimeOnly values within DevExpress-powered WPF apps.

TimeOnly — Second Rounding

The TimeOnly structure includes hours, minutes, seconds, and milliseconds. Since users typically need to select only hours and minutes, our WPF Grid control will automatically round TimeOnly values to the nearest minute within filtering elements. Filters created by our WPF Grid control will also be based on minute intervals.

Additionally, we will support time group intervals, allowing you to display items with the same hour and minute values, even if seconds differ.

TimeOnly — Popup Filters

We will add time-specific options to the DevExpress WPF Grid control's column filter popup to help users filter TimeOnly data with ease.

TimeOnly Editor

At present, you can only use TextEdit with a mask to edit TimeOnly objects (by entering text). We expect to support TimeOnly via a time-specific WPF Editor.

DateOnly/TimeOnly — TreeList Support

In our v24.1 release cycle, we added DateOnly/TimeOnly support to our WPF Grid. With v24.2, we will introduce similar support for the DevExpress WPF TreeList control.

DateOnly/TimeOnly — Property Grid Support

PropertyGrid will automatically generate an editor (with appropriate settings) when an edited object uses DateOnly or TimeOnly properties.

WPF Grid Control — Batch Edit

As you may know, Microsoft Excel allows you to select multiple cells and apply text changes by pressing Ctrl + Enter (instead of Enter). In v24.2, a similar feature will be added to our WPF Grid control, allowing users to apply identical values to multiple cells simultaneously.

WPF Map Control — Bing Maps Deprecation and Azure Maps Support

Because of Microsoft's decision to deprecate and retire Bing Maps, we expect to add Azure Maps support to our WPF Map Control.

Refer to the following blog post to learn more about this change: Important Announcement: Bing Maps for Enterprise Service Deprecation.

WPF Reports

DateOnly & TimeOnly Support

We will introduce support for DateOnly and TimeOnly values within DevExpress Reports. This update will allow you to utilize the aforementioned types when:

creating expression bindings
report and query parameters
calculated fields
and when sorting, grouping, and filtering data.

Refer to What's New in v24.1 to learn more about recent enhancements in this particular space.

Export Enhancements

HTML Export — Preserve Rotated Text

We will introduce expanded text rotation options for reports exported to HTML. With this update, the XRLabel control will preserve text rotation defined by its Angle property (supported angles are 90 degrees, 180 degrees, and 270 degrees, and their negative counterparts). This enhancement will ensure that document text orientation is accurately maintained during HTML export, providing a consistent visual appearance across different formats.

PDF Export — Export Bookmarks

With this new feature, you will be able to simplify/enhance navigation options for PDF documents generated from a report. Bookmarks added to your report will now be preserved in the exported PDF document, allowing users to quickly jump to specific sections within large documents.

Office File API & Office-Inspired Desktop UI Controls

New AI-Powered Enhancements

We will integrate AI-Powered features into our WPF Rich Text Editor and Spreadsheet components. These enhancements will allow users to quickly understand the underlying essence of individual documents via Generative AI summaries and translate documents to a preferred language using AI-powered translations. In addition, we plan to give you the ability to describe images used within Office documents using AI-powered APIs.

To leverage these capabilities, you will need to bring your own Microsoft Azure Open AI API key or use local open-source models powered by Ollama and Onnx Runtime.

Spreadsheet Document API and Spreadsheet UI Control

Dynamic Array Formulas

Dynamic arrays are a modern and powerful way to work with Excel document formulas. Unlike standard array formulas, which return a single value for each cell with a formula, dynamic array functions return a dynamic array of values (this array of values automatically spills into neighboring cells). Dynamic arrays offer many advantages, including new functions (XLOOKUP, XMATCH, Sort, etc.).

We expect to enhance our formula calculation engine and integrate dynamic arrays into relevant DevExpress Spreadsheet-processing tools. Core functionality will include the following:

Dynamic array calculations (formulas) and Spill Range support.
New formula error type (#SPILL!).
Spill range reference (# symbol).
Implicit intersection operator (@ symbol) to return a single formula value instead of an array.

Embed Images in Cells

Modern versions of Microsoft Excel support a new locate image feature - "Place in Cell" (available from the Insert->Picture menu). This option gives you the ability to embed an image directly into a cell instead of placing it over worksheet content.

With v24.2, our Spreadsheet Document API library and desktop Spreadsheet UI control will ship with "Place in Cell" image placement support. As you would expect, this new feature will allow you to import documents with images embedded in worksheet cells and save these documents to supported Excel formats without the content loss. Embedded cell images will be correctly displayed when you preview workbooks using our desktop Spreadsheet editors and when you print/export documents to PDF (and of course, we'll offer new APIs to manage embedded images in code).

Word Processing Document API and Rich Text Editors

Page Borders

With our next update, DevExpress Word-processing components will support Microsoft Word Page Borders (you will be able to import and save documents with page borders to supported Word formats without content loss). Page borders will be displayed properly when you preview the document via the visual control and print/export the document to PDF. APIs to manage page borders will be also available.

Small Caps Formatting Support

In our v24.2 release cycle, DevExpress Word processing tools will ship with Small Caps character formatting support. Small Caps formatting will be applied whenever you preview the document via the visual control and print/export the document to PDF. We will introduce API settings to manage Small Caps formatting in code and enhance the Font dialog for our WPF Rich Text Editor so as to apply appropriate formatting via the User Interface.

Your Feedback Matters

WPF — June 2024 Roadmap (v24.1)

Alexander Russkov (DevExpress) — Tue, 13 Feb 2024 05:00:00 Z

In this post, I'll outline WPF controls/features we expect to ship in our next major update (v24.1). If you'd like to share feedback about the features outlined herein, feel free to submit your thoughts/comments using the surveys below or create a Support Center ticket. We’ll be happy to follow-up.

Accessibility and UI Automation

Inclusive application design is becoming more important every day. With v24.1, we will enhance accessibility-related capabilities including keyboard navigation and screen reader support. Since assistive technologies and UI Automation tests rely on the same automation tree, enhancements in this area will help you address numerous UI test usage scenarios.

Font Icon Images

Once we released font con support in our most recent WinForms product release (v23.2), many of you asked us to introduce this same capability in our WPF product line. With v24.1, you will be able to use font icons (Segoe MDL2 Assets in Windows 10 and Segoe Fluent Icons in Windows 11 fonts) in DevExpress WPF controls (ImageSource objects).

Data Grid - Excel Export with Images Incorporated into Cells

In previous version of Excel, you could only add images as floating objects. As such, our data-aware export option did not support image export. Excel now supports images within data cells. We are currently exploring ways to export images displayed in Data Grid cells and hope to release this feature in mid-June.

Data Grid – Filter by Color

As you may know, Excel allows users to filter tables by values and by colors specified via formatting rules. While our Data Grid already allows you to filter based on conditional formatting rules, this feature may not be discoverable. We expect to enhance our WPF Grid's UI elements to improve overall discoverability/usage.

Data Grid - Aggregate Functions within the Filter Editor

In our next major update (v24.1), you will be able to filter WPF Data Grid collection properties using functions such as Count, Sum, Average. For example, if you display records within a Master-Detail Data Grid, you will be able to find master rows where the number of detail rows is greater than a specific number.

Bar Search Item

We expect to implement a Microsoft Office-inspired Ribbon Bar Search item in our next major update. Bar Search will allow users to quickly locate a Ribbon Bar Item within your application.

Word Processing Document API and Rich Text Editors

Math Equations

With our next update, we expect to support mathematical equations within Word documents. You will be able to import documents with equations using our Word-processing components and save these documents to supported Word formats without content loss.

Gutter and Mirror Margin Page Settings

To improve document rendering, printing and export accuracy, we plan to support Gutter and Mirror Margin page settings for Word documents. Gutter is the space added to the page margin to accommodate binding or folding, while Mirror Margins enables mirrored document layout for double-sided printing.

In v24.1, we'll add new APIs to manage Gutter and Mirror Margin settings in code and enhance the Page Setup dialog for our WPF Rich Text Editor (to change page layout using User Interface elements).

Image Export API

In v24.1, we will introduce new APIs to export Word documents to various image formats. With this functionality, you will be able to create document thumbnails and previews, visualize documents in Web and Mobile applications. The new APIs will allow you to modify target image settings to obtain desired output in both Windows and non-Windows environments.

PDF Document API and PDF Viewer

Signature Info Panel

To improve the user experience when working with signed PDF documents, we plan to implement a new Signature panel for our WPF PDF Viewer. The new panel will offer an intuitive interface to view signature information (such as signer, signing time, and additional data associated with the signature).

Layers

Managing Optional Content (Layers) in PDF documents offers a flexible way to organize document content and control its visibility. This feature is invaluable for applications that deal with complex documents requiring content organization (such as architectural plans, layered maps, diagrams, and multi-language documents).

In our next major release, we will design a new Layers panel for our WPF PDF Viewer (to control layer visibility in the user interface).

Spreadsheet Document API and Spreadsheet UI Controls

Sort and Filter by Color

Our next major update will include sorting/filtering cell range support in a worksheet based on cell font color and cell background color. This functionality will include new APIs and UI elements to manage ranges sorted or filtered by cell color.

Justify and Distributed Horizontal Text Alignment

We plan to enhance Excel document rendering and support Justify and Distributed horizontal alignment for cell text. New alignment types will also affect print output and PDF-exported documents.

Property Grid Row Style

Some of you have asked us to provide an easy way to change Property Grid row formatting based on a cell value or other condition. In our next release, we will add a RowStyle property allowing you to change row background/foreground (and other properties) using a data trigger.

Use Theme Palette Colors in XAML

When creating your application UI, you may need to access colors used by DevExpress themes. We’re working on extending our ThemeResource class so you can effortlessly apply a color from our theme palettes.

<Border BorderBrush="{dxci:ThemeResource ThemeKey='Brush.Window.Background, 
Win11Light=Brush.Window.Alt.Background'}}" />

DevExpress Reporting

New Expression Functions

We will add new expression functions to our criteria language syntax. These functions will offer greater flexibility in shaping and displaying data within DevExpress Reports. New functions will include:

The ability to retrieve the value of the previous column/row
The ability to retrieve the value of the next column/row
The ability to retrieve the current group index
The ability to retrieve the current row index within a group.

SVG Pictures Export

When you add SVG pictures to a report, they will be exported using a vector format (SVG) natively (to maintain image quality). This enhancement affects PDF, Excel, and Word export formats.

Parameter Groups Title Localization

With our built-in DevExpress Reports localization feature, you will be able to localize the titles of parameter groups displayed in the Parameters Panel across all supported platforms.

SqlDataSource Enhancements

First, we'll enhance the user experience in our Data Source Wizard to address the following security-related changes introduced by Microsoft for the MS SQL Server: The certificate chain was issued by an authority that isn't trusted - SQL Server | Microsoft Learn. This will allow you to avoid the "The certificate chain was issued by an authority that is not trusted" error while binding a report to MS SQL Server database if you do not have access to set up the MS SQL Server differently. To achieve this, we will introduce two new options in our Data Source Wizard:

An option that will allow you to turn on/off the MS SQL Server encryption (to specify the Encrypt=No value in the connection string).
An option that will allow you to trust the MS SQL Server certificate without validation (to specify the TrustServerCertificate=True value in the connection string).

Second, we'll add support for the Postgres data driver v.7.0. This will enable you to bind DevExpress Reports to stored procedures introduced starting with v7.0 of the database engine.

JsonDataSource — Transition to System.Text.Json

We have made the decision to revamp the source code of all DevExpress products so that they no longer reference the third-party Newtonsoft.Json assembly. Instead, we will use functionality from the System.Text.Json assembly/NuGet package, which is a part of .NET. During this release cycle, we will be conducting research to identify methods for migration with minimal impact on existing functionality and applications. Our preliminary findings suggest that discrepancies do exist. Our decision is mainly influenced by the security risks associated with the third-party library, as well as the improved performance offered by Microsoft's own library.

WPF — Early Access Preview (v23.2)

Andrey Slabov (DevExpress) — Mon, 18 Sep 2023 02:40:00 Z

This blog post describes new features included in our Early Access Preview (EAP) build. If you are an active DevExpress Universal or DXperience subscriber, you can download and install the EAP today (visit the DevExpress Download Manager to obtain our EAP build).

This EAP may not include all features/products we expect to ship in our v23.2 release cycle. As its name implies, the EAP offers an early preview of what we expect to ship in two months.

End of .NET Standard 2.0 Support

With our next major update v23.2 (December 2023), our assemblies will not be built against this target. Learn more about this change in the following blog post: .NET — .NET Standard 2.0 Deprecation, Support for .NET 6 or .NET 8 (LTS) in DevExpress Libraries (v23.2).

Lightweight Themes with Optimized Cold Start, View Switch, and Memory Usage

Our last major update (v23.1) included a couple of new performance optimized app-wide themes. These themes were shipped as a CTP because we intended to modify internal theme structure further. Our v23.2 EAP is another step towards the finalization of lightweight theme support. Optimizations included in our EAP have yielded the following performance/memory use improvements:

Startup performance: 20-40%
Switch between Views: 10-25%
Memory Footprint: 40-50

If you haven’t tried our lightweight WPF themes, please install the EAP build at your convenience and let us know how the changes impact your project (from a performance standpoint). You can submit feedback anytime via the DevExpress Support Center.

Theme Resources – Preload

In enterprise applications, view switching speed is often more important than application startup speed. With this EAP, you can load theme resources at application startup. You can display a splash screen and load appropriate resources so that DevExpress-powered views start faster when users open them for the first time. This will speed up first tab switching, navigation, window opening, and address other usage scenarios. Our new preload mechanism supports both standard and lightweight themes.

The following graph illustrates preload time and the time required to display the preloaded view for current and new theme preloads (DevExpress v23.2, .NET Framework 4.7.2, Ngen):

Our flexible API allows you to load separate assemblies or a custom user control for your specific usage scenario:

public partial class App : Application {
    static App() {
        ApplicationThemeHelper.PreloadAsync(PreloadCategories.Ribbon, PreloadCategories.Grid);
        // OR
        ApplicationThemeHelper.Preload<MyControl>();
    }
}

Diagram Control – UI Automation

As you may know, Automation UI peers and patterns allow screen readers and other assistive technologies to communicate with your application. We implemented Automation UI patterns for DiagramControl items to help you create accessible applications and appropriate automation tests.

Scheduler - Microsoft 365 Calendar Synchronization

Our WPF Scheduler control exposes new APIs and allows you to seamlessly synchronize user appointments with Microsoft 365 calendars (bi-directionally).

You can export appointments from the Scheduler control to Microsoft 365 calendars, import Microsoft 365 (Outlook) events to the Scheduler control, merge user appointments with Microsoft 365 calendars, and resolve merge conflicts.

In modern applications, developers often create a navigation panel that overlaps the window title. This technique produces a more effective navigation panel and helps use window title space more efficiently.

You can now add this full height panel to our ThemedWindow.

Image Editor - Modify Images

We enhanced our Image Editor so users can load an image and modify it based on the format used in your application. The control includes the following features:

Zoom
Pan
Crop
Rotate
Mirror

Date Editor – Default Date

When the Date Edit is empty and a user begins to enter a value, the Date Edit mask automatically populates all date-related sections (month, day, year) based on the current date. This EAP includes a DefaultDateTime property to change the default date value based on application requirements.

Your Feedback Matters

We realize alpha/beta testing is time consuming. Should you have the opportunity to test our EAP build, we'd welcome your feedback/comments. Feel free to submit any EAP-related issues via the DevExpress Support Center. Thank you.

WPF — Year-End Roadmap (v23.2)

Alexander Russkov (DevExpress) — Tue, 29 Aug 2023 00:20:00 Z

The WPF features/capabilities outlined in this post represent our development priorities for the second half of 2023. Should you have questions about the features/capabilities outlined herein, please post comments in the survey below. Your feedback is welcome and appreciated.

Lightweight Themes with Optimized Cold Start, View Switch and Memory Usage

Structure Finalization – Release to Manufacturing (RTM)

As you may know, our last major update (v23.1) included lightweight themes with numerous performance-related optimizations. These optimizations yielded the following performance gains/memory use improvements:

Startup performance: 20-40%
Switch between Views: 10-25%
Memory Footprint: 40-50%

With v23.2, we will complete work on our updated WPF theme architecture so you can leverage the benefits of our optimizations without risk of a breaking change in future updates.

Windows 11 Themes

Our WPF library currently supports the following lightweight themes:

Win10 (Light, Dark, System, System Colors)
Office2019 (Colorful, Black, High Contrast, System)
VS2019 (Blue, Light, Dark, System)

In v23.2, we will complement this list with a new Windows 11 lightweight theme.

Theme Resources – Preload

In enterprise applications, view switching speed is often more important than application startup speed. With v23.2, we expect to load theme resources when an application starts. You can display a splash screen and load appropriate resources so that DevExpress-powered views start faster when users open them for the first time. This will speed up first tab switching, navigation, window opening, and address other usage scenarios.

.NET 8 Support

You will be able to use our WPF product line with Microsoft’s latest framework and tooling. We expect to support .NET 8 when released later this year.

End of .NET Standard 2 Support

Localization

We expect to streamline localization-related processes, with focus on the following:

Effortless identification of non-translated strings in your application: You will be able to focus solely on the strings requiring translation in your application. You won't need to search for a string in the entire localization string dataset.
Leveraging RESX Files for localization: you will be able to use familiar RESX files to store and manage your localization strings, ensuring more straightforward integration with your existing localization processes.
Direct string translation: you will be able to modify strings that are not present in localization assemblies directly in our Localization tool.

Our new Localization tool will help you translate non-localized strings during a debug session:

In addition, you will be able to use our enhanced localization API to log non-translated strings, and use custom RESX files:

//Log non-translated strings 
private void XtraLocalizer_QueryLocalizedStringNonTranslated(object sender, XtraLocalizer.QueryLocalizedStringEventArgs e) { 
    Debug.WriteLine(e.ResourceStringID); 
} 

//Use a ResourceManager from your project to apply strings from your RESX files 
XtraLocalizer.UserResourceManager = MyResources.ResourceManager;

Data Grid

Selector Column in Master Grids

A selector column allows you to select a single/all rows in our WPF Grid using Check Boxes. As you may know, selector columns are not supported in master grids, however we expect to address this limitation in v23.2.

Highlight Special Characters in Search Results

Our Data Gird Search Panel allows you to search text using special characters, such as percent and minus. However, if you need to find data items with these characters, the Search Panel won’t work because all special characters are excluded from text search. In v23.2, you will be able to use escape symbols to use special characters as simple text.

Preventing Focus Change

We will introduce a CurrentItemChanging event to help prevent focusing Data Grid rows based on conditions. This will help you implement a disabled row effect and solve other usage scenarios (when users must not interact with a certain subset of rows).

Command to Delete Selected Rows

For better MVVM support, we will add a command to remove rows selected by a user. You will be able to bind this command to a button and get rid of code-behind (removing the rows from the source in one batch action without excessive updates).

Image Editing

We expect to enhance our Image Editor so users can load an image and modify it based on the format required in your application. The control will include the following features:

Zoom
Pan
Crop
Rotate

Editor Embedded Labels

In views with little horizontal space, you may find it useful to incorporate editor labels directly into the editor border.

This technique is widely used in Material Design 3 and can help you freshen app appearance with little dev effort.

Date Edit – Default Value

When the Date Edit is empty and a user begins to enter a value, the Date Edit mask automatically populates all date-related sections (month, day, year) based on today’s date. In v23.2, we will add a property to change the default date value based on application requirements.

In modern applications, developers often create a navigation panel that overlaps the window title. You can find this design pattern in our demos, where we used a custom solution to implement this functionality:

This technique produces a more effective navigation panel and helps use window title space more efficiently.
In v23.2, you will be able to add a full height panel to our ThemedWindow.

Diagram Control – UI Automation

As you may know, Automation UI peers and patterns, allow screen readers and other assistive technologies to communicate with your application. We will implement Automation UI patterns for DiagramControl items to help you create accessible applications and create appropriate automation tests.

Your Feedback Matters

Before we let you go – please take a moment to complete this short survey. Your feedback is invaluable.

What's New in v23.1

If you have yet to review the features/capabilities introduced in our most recent major update, please visit the following webpage and let us know what you think of this release by responding to our online survey: Explore Our Newest Features (v23.1).