AdvancedDataGrid and Charting Samples
As I was preparing for the pre-release user group tour, I was surprised at just how much content around the new Flex 3 features was already available. The Flex engineering teams have been working diligently to be more transparent for the benefit of our customers - and it shows. The main problem I encountered while browsing all these samples, was that they seemed to be put together by different engineers, which meant that each had it’s own style and formatting. I’ve pulled many of these samples together as it relates the AdvancedDataGrid and new charting features, and made them available for viewing and download.
This sample application consists of a filmstrip area at the top and a main viewing area that takes up the remainder of the viewable space. You can click on the grey buttons on either side of the filmstrip to move backwards and forwards in the available samples. I didn’t get the chance to put a stop on the boundaries, so you’ll just have to stop yourself when you run out of samples. Once you’ve identified a sample you’re interested in viewing, you can click on the thumbnail in the filmstrip to view it in the main area. I put a little transition effect in there that might be interesting to some.
What can you say about the AdvancedDataGrid? There’s so much new functionality in the word “Advanced” that it is downright hard to describe it all. On the user group tour, I walked through some of the features by copying/pasting already completed applications. It was the only way I could fit a decent number of features into the small amount time available. Multiple sort criteria, cell selection modes, grouped column headers, formatting functions, working with hierarchical data, making hierarchical data from flat data and summary fields are the examples that are covered in the samples application.
The Flex charting components have been significantly improved as well, especially in the way in which you work with visualizations. The most common requests have become features to include support for an arbitrary number of axes, axes renderers, and per-item labels and fills. Continuing on to the additional interactivity features, there’s now support for a selection mode on individual series. This type of interaction can be single click to select individual items, and you can additionally drag and drop over a group. Drag and drop events on the charts themselves, alongside with the new data-oriented API, make even more interactions possible.