By Charles R Hankey - 4/20/2007
Very new to both Strataframe and .NET ( decided from my VFP experience that picking a great framework was the key to getting productive in a new environment quickly - I am delighted that I appear to have done that by choosing Strataframe ! )
I'm a big believer in making money off the brilliance and hard work of others. 
I have no doubt that once I get reasonably proficient in SF I am going to be looking for more libraries of guru gizmos that are going to make me look good to my clients.
Is there any consensus about the best third party libraries for a SF developer ( based on Microfour support, value, overall features etc )
Front runners seem to be DevExpress and Infragistics. I've been watching some of the videos on the DevExpress site ( incredible plummy Brit doing the narration ) and enjoying that very much.
I understand there are evaluation versions of both of these available but my knowledge of SF and .NET is not currently up to doing them justice.
Would very much like to hear opinions of SF developers using those libraries so I can be looking ahead as I plan my first serious client work.
TIA
Charles
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By Ivan George Borges - 4/20/2007
Hi Charles.I have evaluated both Infragistics and DevXpress. On the components, I've just commited to Infragistics, and bought their Advantage .NET package. I'm still using the trial from DevXpress though, as I haven't decided about a Report Engine yet, so I'm using their XtraReports. There's the ActiveReports too in this matter, and I hope to come to a final decision soon. Following your philosofy in a way, I tend to stick to what the SF guys decide to use themselves, I've always got the best advices from them. Abraços.
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By Ben Hayat - 4/20/2007
Hi Charles;
I've been a customer of DevExpress for many years (from Delphi days). One thing I admit, their products are very good and support is very good (but SF support is best).
You can get the entire .Net package for Windows and web as one package, including full reports.
However, with Infragistics (IG), you have to buy the .Net Advantage and ASP Advantage and Active Reports. That can get expensive.
But Ivan brought up a good point, that SF team uses IG tools and I also have faith in what SF team choses for their work.
So, I need to talk to SF team more about this when I get to TX for class to make a decision!
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By Ben Hayat - 4/20/2007
However, with Infragistics (IG), you have to buy the .Net Advantage and ASP Advantage and Active Reports. That can get expensive.
I made a mistake making that statement. Just ckecked their site, and they do have one package that includes both Windows and ASP. Sorry!
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By Ivan George Borges - 4/20/2007
I made a mistake making that statement. Just ckecked their site, and they do have one package that includes both Windows and ASP. Sorry! Hi Ben. I was just going to tell you that, it is the NetAdvantage for .NET.
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By Ivan George Borges - 4/20/2007
Ah, and if any of you decide to buy it, it is cheaper in the ComponentSource site, than it is in the Infragistics site itself... go figure... 
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By Ben Hayat - 4/20/2007
I was just going to tell you that, it is the NetAdvantage for .NET.
Yes, Thanks!
Have you finalized your decision on reports yet?
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By Ivan George Borges - 4/20/2007
No, guess who I am waiting for... 
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By Trent L. Taylor - 4/20/2007
Hey Charles....and guys  DevExpress and Infragistics both have good controls. DevExpress has a good collection but there are some speed issues the larger the forms or application becomes. Infragistics has a very solid team of developers and infrastructure behind the company (not that DevExpress doesn't). The Infragistics controls are going to be slightly smoother in implementation and controls such as the masking controls (i.e. a date control) have much more nimble or granular adjustments that give you, the end developer, the most control. Both DevExpress and Infragistics come with source code, which is a minor point, but the nice thing about Infragistics is there comments and extremely clean and structured code. Just looking at the code gives you a warm fuzzy feeling . DevExpress comes with the source, but they strip out all white space and comments before shipping, so it is much more difficult to work through a problem and write towards their controls. Honestly, though, you are not going to spend a lot of time in their source, nor should you. The only time we are in the source is when we are creating object models that will properly interface with their controls. Infragistics makes this much easier from our perspective and so this will probably be the side that gets the most attention in the future.
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By Ben Hayat - 4/20/2007
In the past years, I had started using different third party components and as time went on, I felt like I was stuck in quick sand. The more I tried to move around, the deeper I got into problems with compatibilty issues, lake of support for newer versions or going out of business. I had provided so many nice features for the end user. At the end of the day, I realized, even if I had given them a simple and straight forward app, they would have been happy. All the extra fancy stuff caused me so much grif.
This time, I'm trying to avoid [as much as possible], the third party nightmare.
My question to Trent is as following: Can we simply develop a comnplete App, just using the components you [SF Tab] give us? Beside, we need to get reporting tools.
How far can we can with your compoents? What else do we really "NEED"?
Thank you in advance!
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By Greg McGuffey - 4/20/2007
I have a related, but slightly more focused question about components. I find myself needing to provide my users with a control that allows formatting of text (bold, italic, lists, etc.). Now, if the only place they used the this information was within the app, I'd just use the RTF textbox. However, this is not the case. The text needs to shown in a web based reporting tool. Soooooo....
I wondering if any of you have any experience with any WinForm HTML editors? Or with using an RTF textbox to edit HTML. I'll need to store the formatted text as HTML. There are a lot that wrap IE, but I'm concerned about performance, memory issues and security. Apose has one that isn't dependent on IE but it can't do much yet. Any of you have any experience with HTML Editors in WinForms?
Thanks!
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By Trent L. Taylor - 4/20/2007
This time, I'm trying to avoid [as much as possible], the third party nightmare. You are right on the money here and is in fact the same approach that we have taken. We have been killed in the past by purchasing ActiveX controls and 3rd party products just to see them go out of business and then us have a compatability issue which halts production so we can write a work around. The fewer 3rd party controls that you use the better off you will be. How far can we can with your compoents? What else do we really "NEED"? This is why we created the application themes and continue to create new controls...to prevent 3rd party dependence. We do use some 3rd party controls, don't get me wrong here. For example we use the Infragistics text edit control with their integrated spell checking. We also use the Infragistics grid. We will also use some of the Infragistics calendar and scheduling controls in teh future, but it basically stops about there. Recently we were using a 3rd party control within FoxPro for UDP support...it failed...at the worst time....and we ended up writing our own anyway which dramatically sped things up and reduced the code. So you do have to be careful of going 3rd party control crazy. But in moderation, sure...especially if you pick the right ones and the right companies. For example, we have a new two new controls that will be released in the next update. One is a ThemedLinkMenu which provides a similar functionality to the Outlook navigation bar or menu. This control can also be used as a vertical page tab that will automatically control a PanelManagers active pages, as well as be used in conjunction with a ThemedContainer to provide standard links within a single control. This came out of the need to replace some 3rd party controls which we had used in the past. Another control is a ThreadManager which allows an unlimited number of methods to be launched through a single control without having to manually create a bunch of threads in a collection then manage it yourself....it just speeds development when you have the need to launch a number of different threads and then need to be notified upon completions. These controls came out of the need to from our commercial application development and the desire not to use a 3rd party control.
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By Ben Hayat - 4/20/2007
Trent, your wise and mature answer i
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By Ben Hayat - 4/20/2007
Trent, your wise and mature answer is well taken. I would like to add one proposition. I'd love to see SF (MicroFour) come out with new components that are tied directly with SF, as a separate product package for purchase. It's a lot better to deal with one vendor.(i.e. grid, report and etc).
Another option would be to buy a third party product "Through" your company, meaning you guys have that product all tied properly with SF and we buy it from you. This way, you don't have to develop a grid or report tool, but the time you spend to make it work with SF, is justified by us purchasing it from you in a different price range, More like an OEM version!
Otherwise, every developer has to go through the time of getting it to work, and asking the same questions over and over. Please think about this option and perhaps put up a poll to see how many people are interested in what products.
Thanks for the feedback!
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