Data Binding

Data Binding to the grid can be achieved with a single line of code. The grid supports all kinds of "lists" from IList derived types to ADO.NET Datasource instances. The grid automatically discovers the schema of the datasource at run-time, including any relations setup between tables in a DataSource, and renders the grid contents automatically. You can alter the grid's schema to hide columns and include unbound columns.

Windows Forms Essential Grid offers a whole artillery of flexible data binding options. Data binding support is built-in for the following datasources :

• DataTable
• DataView
• DataSet
• BindingSource
• BindingList
• List
• XML data
• Single Dimensional Array
• Any component that implements the collection interfaces like IList, ITypedList, IBindingList, etc.

Essential Grid also supports binding of individual cells to datasources. This is useful in cases where a ComboBox's choices need to be based on a foreign table query.

Essential Grid can be bound to any collection that derives from .NET collection interfaces such as IList, IBindingList and ITypedList.

A Generic Collection can handle any Type in a 'generic' and 'type-safe' manner. In creating a generic collection we can achieve 'type-safety' without deriving from a base collection type and implementing type-specific members. The GridGroupingControl can be bound to a Binding list created using generic collections.

A calendar pop-up can be displayed when accessing a Date Time Picker cell.

Boolean cells can be displayed as Check box cells when using the Data-bound Grid control.

Pictures from a bound datasource can be displayed inside a cell as a drop-down or an image box on a form. Options that determine image positioning such as FitToCell, NoResize and FitProportionally are available when using the Grid control.

Essential Grid lets users expand and collapse nested relations within a grid. Users can set the grid's datasource to an ADO.NET DataTable or DataView with a foreign key and relation. The grid then lets users show or hide details of records in the parent table.

Users can also bind a grid-data-bound Grid to a custom collection. A grid-data-bound Grid can be bound to any collection that derives from IList.

The appearance of hierarchical data in a Databound GridControl can customized. Custom treelines, indentation settings, and highlighting of each hierarchy level can be specified.

Foreign Key Tables can be displayed as a drop-down when using the Databound GridControl.

The Combo box buttons can be displayed: only for current cell, current row, or always.

A Filter Bar is a row of Combo boxes displayed at the top of a grid providing filtering options for grid data. The Combo box entries are generated from unique values in the column.

Complex filtering can also be integrated in the GridDataBoundGrid control, by utilizing a custom filter dialog.

Individual records can be displayed spaning multiple rows and neighboring columns as seen in Quicken ®.

The grid-data-bound Grid supports the inclusion of multiple row and columns headers. Additional unbound rows or columns can also be included in the grid-data-bound Grid.

Users can have fixed rows at the top of the grid that show a variety of controls such as combo boxes, drop-down lists, check boxes and buttons.

Grid cells can be formatted depending either on their value or the value of another cell. Essential Grid provides an event for this kind of formatting which allows customization of cell properties such as back color, borders, font, text color and many more.

Essential Grid provides an event for this kind of formatting which allows the customization of any cell property such as backcolor, borders, font, textcolor and many more.

Pass Through grouping is a great way to take control of data being retrieved from the datasource. The default setting of the GridControl pull all records from the underlying datasource to perform grouping and calculation of summaries.

However, you can override this behavior using "Pass Through Grouping" and retrieve only required records from the datasource. Even when the grid is bound to millions of records Pass Through grouping will retrieve only group information from the datasource. Records of a specific group will be retrieved on-demand as users expand groups.

Pass Through grouping can be implemented against any datasource using any data retrieval technique. The most ideal data retirieval techniques is LINQ, which is elaborated in the next section.

LINQ is a great way to retrieve data. LINQ lets you build intuitive query expressions in any language with optional support to transform, project, or shape data in many forms before it gets displayed.
For more information on LINQ, see http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/netframework/aa904594.aspx.

The Grid now supports binding to LINQ through "Pass Through Grouping" introduced in the previous section. Binding the grid with LINQ results has many advantages. The default setting of the grid retrieves all records from the bound datasource. This could become a serious overhead when dealing with large datasources. To override this setting, the grid is bound to the LINQ query results instead of the datasource. Then data from the datasource is retrieved on-demand when s user requests it(by expand and collapse of groups).