Data Representation

When building a business application using the eXpressApp Framework, you don't have to create forms to represent data, arrange numerous controls, write code to bind these controls to data, and manage this data by interacting with the DBMS you choose. If you're using the eXpressApp Framewok, you only need to design your business model. The framework then handles data server management and automatically generates a UI for the required platform. This makes it easy to maintain applications, since if you change data, you don't have to modify numerous forms and/or web pages - it is done automatically.

To represent business object details, a Detail View is autogenerated. Detail Views consist of View Items, including Property Editors - a View Item type that present property data via a particular control. A vast range of Property Editors for different data types is supplied with XAF. Some of them are used to represent data by default. Other Property Editors can be assigned when required. In addition, you can implement, for instance, custom Property Editors for specific data types or to use a specific control.

Property Editors are supplied for the ASP.NET platform as well.

To show object collections, the eXpressApp Framework generates List Views for each registered business class. In a UI, List Views are represented via List Editors. As with Property Editors, List Editors represent mediators between data (object collections) and a particular control. There are several List Editors supplied with XAF for Windows Forms and ASP.NET applications: GridListEditor and ASPxGridListEditor, SchedulerListEditor and ASPxSchedulerListEditor, TreeListEditor and ASPxTreeListEditor, ChartListEditor and ASPxChartListEditor, PivotGridListEditor and ASPxPivotGridListEditor. However, you are free to implement your own List Editors to satisfy your requirements.

In addition to using the required editors, you can customize the editor layout in a Detail View, column set in a List View and set different options for Views as a whole. To do this, just customize the Application Model using the Model Editor. If there is something you cannot achieve in the Model Editor, you can do this in code. In addition, end-users can also customize both the Detail View editor layout and List View column layout.

You may wish to provide several customized variants of the same View, and allow an end-user to choose the desired View at run time. For instance, end-users may need to use different List View column sets and different Detail View layouts in different scenarios. They may also need to use two List View modes: a single List View and a List View together with the Detail View. XAF offers you a built-in implementation of this feature in the View Variants Module.

You can make data representation flashier. For instance, you may need to highlight certain columns or objects in a List View; emphasize, hide or disable specific properties when they display a particular value or hide or disable Actions when the current object satisfies a particular criteria. All this is possible with the built-in Conditional Appearance Module. Just declare a conditional appearance rule in the Model Editor or in code.