Office-Inspired Controls (WinForms & WPF) — Early Access Preview (v24.2) — AI-Powered Behaviors and Accessibility Enhancements

We are excited to introduce a set of new, powerful features coming to DevExpress Rich Text Editor and Spreadsheet Control for WinForms and WPF. This post outlines what’s inside our current Early Access Preview build v24.2, which is now available for download for our Universal and DXperience subscribers.

For additional information on what you can expect, please refer to our v24.2 roadmap.

Important Changes in v24.2

.NET 9 Support

The DevExpress WinForms and WPF product lines now support NET 9 RC1 .

.NET Framework 4.6.2 and .NET 8 Support

With this release, minimally supported framework and IDE versions will be as follows:

• .NET 4.6.2
• .NET 8
• Visual Studio 2019

Learn more about this global change in the following announcement: .NET — .NET 8 and .NET Framework 4.6.2 Are Minimally Supported Target Frameworks for DevExpress Libraries in v24.2

AI-Powered Behaviors in Rich Text and Spreadsheet Editors for WinForms and WPF

In v24.2, we introduce several built-in AI behaviors that integrate seamlessly into our DevExpress WinForms and WPF visual controls. In previous blog post (DevExpress AI-Powered Extensions — Extending Text Editors with AI Capabilities — Early Access Preview (v24.2)), we outlined the potential of these AI-driven features. Here, we dive deeper into how they enhance desktop Rich Text and Spreadsheet controls.

AI Behaviors in User Interface

The DevExpress AI behaviors for Rich Edit and Spreadsheet controls offer diverse capabilities for modifying, analyzing, and improving content within Word and Excel documents. Below are some of the key actions available in the controls’ User Interface:

Each AI behavior can be individually integrated in the Rich Text or Spreadsheet Control, giving you flexibility in enhancing control’s capabilities based on your usage scenario. Once a behavior is added to the Rich Text or Spreadsheet Control and the AI service registration is complete, the new "AI Text Transform" submenu becomes available in the control’s context menu during runtime. AI-related menu options are context-dependent and become enabled only when the relevant document content (paragraphs with text, worksheet cells or document graphics) is selected.

Almost all AI behaviors (except for specific Spreadsheet behaviors listed in the table above) do not modify your document directly. Instead, they open a special dialog which contains the result of the AI service’s request, offering users control over the output.
In these dialogs, users can write their own requests to AI services, review the AI-generated content/response, modify it as needed, copy the generated data to the Clipboard, and choose whether to discard changes or insert/replace data in the document.

Here is an example of such an AI dialog:

Integrating AI Behaviors in Rich Text and Spreadsheet Applications

In this section, we will describe the required steps to enable DevExpress AI-Powered features in DevExpress Rich Text Editor and Spreadsheet Control for WinForms and WPF platforms.

Prerequisites

To get started, you need to meet the following prerequisites:

• .NET 8 SDK or .NET Framework v4.7.2
• An Active DevExpress Universal or DXperience Subscription that grants access to download Early Access Preview v24.2 build.
• For Open AI:
  • An active Open AI Subscription.
  • An API Key.
  • The OpenAI .NET SDK
• For Azure Open AI:
  • An active Azure subscription and the Azure Open AI Service resource. Refer to the following tutorial to learn how to set up the resource: Create and deploy an Azure OpenAI Service resource.
  • The Azure OpenAI .NET SDK.

Installing NuGet Packages and Registering AI Service

• Add the following NuGet packages to your application:
  • DevExpress.AIIntegration.Azure.OpenAI or DevExpress.AIIntegration.OpenAI
  • DevExpress.AIIntegration.Desktop
  • DevExpress.AIIntegration.WinForms or DevExpress.AIIntegration.WPF
• Register AI services using your personal service credentials and the default extensions container AIExtensionsContainerDesktop.Default:

AIExtensionsContainerDesktop.Default.RegisterChatClientOpenAIService(
    new AzureOpenAIClient(
        new Uri(azureOpenAIEndpoint), 
        new System.ClientModel.ApiKeyCredential(azureOpenAIKey)),
    deploymentName);

Adding AI Behaviors in a WinForms Application

In Visual Studio, open the Toolbox window, locate the BehaviorManager component and drag and drop it onto the form. Then, access its smart tag and click “Edit Behaviors”.

In the BehaviorManager’s Collection Editor, click the “Add Snap Windows Behavior” button, expand the “AI-Powered Behaviors” submenu and choose the behavior you would like to add in your application. Once complete, the behavior will be associated with a suitable control. You may change the behavior target (associated control) at design time as you require.

It’s also possible to attach behaviors to Rich Text and Spreadsheet Control in code. Use the BehaviorManager.Attach method as follows:

using DevExpress.AIIntegration.Desktop;
using DevExpress.AIIntegration.WinForms;

// Register RichEditControl's behaviors
behaviorManager.Attach<SummarizeBehavior>(richEditControl, behaviorSettings => behaviorSettings.Properties.SummarizationMode = DevExpress.AIIntegration.SummarizeBehaviorMode.Abstractive);
behaviorManager.Attach<ExplainBehavior>(richEditControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<ShortenBehavior>(richEditControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<ExpandBehavior>(richEditControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<ToneStyleBehavior>(richEditControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<ProofreadBehavior>(richEditControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<RewriteStyleBehavior>(richEditControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<CustomRequestBehavior>(richEditControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<TranslateBehavior>(richEditControl, behaviorSettings => behaviorSettings.Properties.Languages = new LanguageInfo[] {
                 new LanguageInfo("de-DE"), new LanguageInfo("fr-FR")
            });;
behaviorManager.Attach<GenerateDescriptionBehavior>(richEditControl);

// Register SpreadsheetControl's behaviors
behaviorManager.Attach<SummarizeBehavior>(spreadsheetControl, behaviorSettings => behaviorSettings.Properties.SummarizationMode = DevExpress.AIIntegration.SummarizeBehaviorMode.Abstractive);
behaviorManager.Attach<ExplainBehavior>(spreadsheetControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<ProofreadBehavior>(spreadsheetControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<TranslateBehavior>(spreadsheetControl, behaviorSettings => behaviorSettings.Properties.Languages = new LanguageInfo[] {
                 new LanguageInfo("de-DE"), new LanguageInfo("fr-FR")
            });
behaviorManager.Attach<GenerateDescriptionBehavior>(spreadsheetControl);
behaviorManager.Attach<FormulaExplanationBehavior>(spreadsheetControl);

Note that some behaviors may require additional setup. For example, the Translate behavior requires that you add supported languages in the behavior’s Languages collection. Otherwise, the Translate option will be disabled.

Adding AI Behaviors in a WPF Application

To enable AI capabilities for Rich Text Editor and Spreadsheet Control in a WPF application, define DevExpress.AIIntegration.Wpf.Office and DevExpress.AIIntegration.Desktop namespaces in XAML. Then, add the required behaviors to the Interaction.Behaviors collection.

The following code snippet shows how to add all supported AI behaviors for WPF Rich Text Editor:

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 x:Name="richEditControl" CommandBarStyle="Ribbon">
    <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>

This code demonstrates how to add AI behaviors for WPF Spreadsheet Control:

xmlns:dxmvvm="http://schemas.devexpress.com/winfx/2008/xaml/mvvm"
xmlns:dxspreadsheet="http://schemas.devexpress.com/winfx/2008/xaml/spreadsheet" 
xmlns:wpf="clr-namespace:DevExpress.AIIntegration.Wpf;assembly=DevExpress.AIIntegration.Wpf.v24.2"
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"

<dxspreadsheet:SpreadsheetControl x:Name="richEditControl" CommandBarStyle="Ribbon">
    <dxmvvm:Interaction.Behaviors>
        <wpfo:SpreadsheetSummarizeBehavior />
        <wpfo:SpreadsheetExplainBehavior />
        <wpfo:SpreadsheetProofreadBehavior />
        <wpfo:SpreadsheetTranslateBehavior >
            <desktop:LanguageInfo Culture="de-DE"/>
        </wpfo:SpreadsheetTranslateBehavior>
        <wpfo:SpreadsheetFormulaExplanationBehavior />
        <wpfo:SpreadsheetCustomRequestBehavior />
        <wpfo:SpreadsheetGenerateDescriptionBehavior/>
    </dxmvvm:Interaction.Behaviors>
</dxspreadsheet:SpreadsheetControl>

Accessibility Enhancements - Alt Text dialogs

In v24.2, we implemented new AI-Powered Alt Text dialogs for WinForms and WPF Rich Text Editors and Spreadsheet Controls.
The Alt Text dialog allows you to set accessible descriptions for shape objects in 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 enable this functionality, follow the steps from the previous section of the current blog post to register the AI service and then, attach the DevExpress.AIIntegration.WinForms.GenerateDescriptionBehavior behavior for RichEditControl or SpreadsheetControl in a WinForms application, or attach the RichEditGenerateDescriptionBehavior/SpreadsheetGenerateDescriptionBehavior behavior in a WPF application.

The new built-in dialogs are available from the shape’s context menu. To activate the Alt Text dialog, select a document shape, or image, or chart, open the context menu and click the “View Alt Text…” context menu item.

Your Feedback Matters

We value your feedback. Please take a moment to respond to the following survey and let us know how we can best serve your needs now and into the future:

Should you encounter an issue while using this Early Access Preview build (v24.2), please submit a support ticket via the DevExpress Support Center.