Features We Expect to Ship in the First CTP

We are a couple of months away from the official release of v18.2 and wanted to share some of our release plans with you. As always, we welcome your feedback.

WinForms Reporting

Report Designer – Vertical Bands

We’ve added three new types of report bands to our Reporting platform: Vertical Detail, Vertical Header and Vertical Total. These bands allow you to create a report wherein record fields are arranged vertically and record printed horizontally, from left to right. Like its name suggests, this new layout mirrors that of a vertical grid – wherein columns represent rows and rows represent columns.

By introducing vertical bands, we were forced to re-design the report surface. With our upcoming release, document areas that do not contain controls are marked in white and band captions are drawn from the left to the right document margin.

Picture Box – Free-Hand Drawing in Print Preview

Over the year, we’ve received many requests to enhance Print Preview Content Editing and provide a way to sign a document. Our upcoming release will give you the ability to draw any figure when displaying a report in the Print Preview:

Picture Box – Image Upload in Print Preview

This functionality relates in part to the feature mentioned a moment ago. You will now be able to upload an image or choose it from a list of predefined images when displaying a report in the Print Preview.

Picture Box – SVG Image Support

We will give you the ability to use SVG images for document creation. This functionality will not include support for images with gradients and texts. We hope to extend this functionality in future iterations (based on usage feedback):

We expect to incorporate these new features across all supported report platforms, including Web and WPF.

Web Reporting 

Web Report Designer and HTML5 Document Viewer – New Color Schemes and Custom Scheme Support

In previous versions, our HTML5 Document Viewer and HTML5 Report Designer offered only two themes: light and dark. We now allow you to apply any DevExtreme Theme (except Material) to both the Viewer and Designer or change appearance manually:

Web Report Designer - Watermark Display

Watermarks are now visible in the Web Report Designer. This allows end-users to apply pre-printed forms and correctly position report controls:

Web Document Viewer – Flexible Tab Panel Position

Our support team has received many requests related to tab panel position and we’ve implemented a way for you to switch Tab Panel position from right to left using a single property:

Web Document Viewer and Report Designer – Client-Side API Enhancements

We've extended the client-side API of the Web Report Designer and Document Viewer with the following capabilities:

• Hide specific export formats or the entire Export Options panel and customize export options;
• Change Toolbox item tooltips;
• Refresh report tabs;
• Respond when switching between report tabs;
• Customize the Field List actions

Open/Save Report Dialogs - Search Support

We've incorporated a search panel into the Web Report Designer’s Open/Save Dialog so end-users can quickly locate a specific report in storage:

Angular Reporting NPM Package

We are going to release an NPM package to help you integrate our HTML5 Document Viewer and Web Report Designer into an Angular-based application:

Module code:

import { BrowserModule } from '@angular/platform-browser';
import { NgModule } from '@angular/core';
import { AppComponent } from './app.component';
import { DxReportViewerModule } from 'devexpress-reporting-angular';
@NgModule({
  declarations: [
    AppComponent
  ],
  imports: [
    BrowserModule,
    DxReportViewerModule  ],
  providers: [],
  bootstrap: [AppComponent]
})
export class AppModule { }

App.component.html code:

<div><dx-report-viewer [reportUrl]="reportUrl" height="800px" cssClass='myViewer'><dxrv-request-options [invokeAction]="invokeAction" [host]="hostUrl"></dxrv-request-options><dxrv-tabpanel-settings width="500" position="Left"></dxrv-tabpanel-settings><dxrv-callbacks 
          (BeforeRender)="BeforeRender($event)" 
          (CustomizeMenuActions)="CustomizeMenuActions($event)"
          (CustomizeElements)="CustomizeElements($event)"></dxrv-callbacks></dx-report-viewer></div>

Query Builder - Improved UX and Query Parameters Support

We’ve updated the properties panel interface in the Query Builder component to improve discoverability of query properties and table items. We’ve also added the ability to create query parameters.

Features in Progress But Not Included in the CTP

All Platforms

Report Wizard – Page Setup and Report Color Scheme Pages

We will add new Report Wizard page so you can specify paper size, orientation and document margins. The second page will allow you to select report control colors:

Report Controls – New Default Font 

We will stop using Times New Roman as our standard font.

End-User Report Designer - Script Code Completion Offline Mode

Currently, this feature requires an internet connection to our hosted service and works only for built-in .NET types and types from our source code. Our upcoming release will give you the ability to activate code completion in offline mode (and it will support custom assemblies).

WinForms Reporting

End-User Report Designer - Office-Inspired Property Grid UI

We will update the properties panel so it mimics Microsoft Office’s new UX

Data Source Wizard – JSON and DevExpress ORM Persistent Object Data Sources

We will include two new data source types into the Data Source Wizard allowing you to bind reports to JSON and DevExpress ORM Persistent Objects.

Miscellaneous improvements

• End-User Report Designer – Skinned Save / Open File Dialogs:we will update the file dialogs used in the End-User Report Designer with those released in v17.2.
• Expression Editor - PageIndex and PageCount Variables: we will update advanced expression bindings mode so you can use PageIndex and PageCount variables in the expressions constructed for the PrintOnPage event handler. 
• High-DPI - Known Issues Resolution: we will fix all known/reproducible issues within our Document Viewer and End-User Report Designer on high-dpi displays. 

ASP.NET Core Reporting

We will extend our support for .NET Core and strive to deliver the level of functionality that is currently available on other supported platforms. Enhancements will include:

• Embedded Visual Studio Report Designer.
• Give you a way to handle report control events just like standard .NET Framework apps.

Web Reporting

Improved Internal Server Error Handling

As you know, internal server errors can occur when attempting to open a report in either our Web Report Designer or display it within our HTML5 Document Viewer. To discover the underlying cause of the error, you must currently register a special logger-service in your web application and examine the collected logs. We will update our Web Reporting components to give you the ability to show an error's details in a browser instead of the standard 'Internal Server Error' text. 

Report and Dashboard Server

Administrative Panel Modern UI (Release Version)

We will complete and ship the Report Server’s new user interface and enable it by default. This new SPA user interface fully replicates the functionality of our old administrative panel, renders its UI on the client with improved response times and makes it easier to locate specific items and execute operations using lists of documents and scheduled tasks instead of single tiles.

Localization Support

We will add a new assembly to our Localization Server and allow you to translate all administrative panel interface elements along with report and dashboard designer and viewer components.

White-Labeling Support

We will give you the ability to change the default color scheme of the administrative panel interface and replace built-in product logos.

Display Dashboards in Remote Applications

We will give you the ability to display dashboards generated with the Report and Dashboard Server within a custom application.

What We Hope to Include in v18.2 (no promises yet)

All Platforms: Parameter Panel Usability

We will improve our Reporting platform’s Parameters Panel – to both simplify usage and reduce the amount of code you write to deliver advanced functionality to end users. Specifically, we will address shortcomings in the following usage scenarios:

• Pass a null value
• Hide one parameter based on the value of another
• Change the Parameters panel’s appearance (editors, editor caption locations)
• Allow a developer to pre-select all parameter values if a parameter is data bound
• Show “Select All” item when all parameter values are selected
• Sort parameter values by display names

Try now!

If you are an active Universal subscriber and would like to test any of these features prior to its official release, please email our support team at support@devexpress.com or create a private ticket in the Support Center. With that, we can verify your account and provide you with a v18.2 preview installation privately.If you are using a trial and want to try this feature today, you can purchase a DevExpress Universal license online (this will give you access to early builds such as CTP).

If you own a non-Universal subscription and are ready to upgrade, email us at clientservices@devexpress.com for preferential upgrade pricing.

We are very interested in your thoughts! What do you think about these new features? Do you think we’ve missed something with our implementation?