Whether this is the first time you’re looking at NetAdvantage, or a seasoned customer, here’s the definitive guide on getting started with the NetAdvantage toolset.
If you have purchased NetAdvantage already, and have registered you’re license key with your Infragistics online profile, all of your downloads are made available at the My IG Keys and Downloads page. If you haven’t purchased a license yet, but wish to download for evaluation purposes, you can go directly to the downloads page.
Note that the Help file is not included with the main install file. The help content is all provided online at http://help.infragistics.com for your reference. If you prefer to install the help locally, you can download the latest version from the downloads page.
Now that you’ve downloaded the product, it’s time to install it. You’ll notice that your download is a zip file, with multiple installation files. The installs are all named to clearly state what they contain. If you’re looking that the WebClient installation package and you’re not sure whether you want to use CLR20 or CLR35, here’s a quick tip. If you’re using Visual Studio 2008, you’ll want to use CLR 3.5. For Visual Studio 2005, you’ll want to use CLR 2.0. You do not need to uninstall prior versions of NetAdvantage before installing. The installations are meant to work side by side, as shown in Figure 1 below.
It doesn’t matter whether you install the samples first or the product first, but as a rule I usually install the product first.
When you install the tools and it asks you for your CDKey, enter the key without any spaces or dashes.
Now that you’ve installed the product, there’s a few steps left to get it set up.
The first thing you’ll want to do is get the tools installed into the Visual Studio Toolbox. There are three ways of doing this.
This option is by far the easiest. Found in your Start Menu, under Infragistics > NetAdvantage [Version] > NetAdvantage for .NET Tools, there is a link for “Create Visual Studio Toolbox Tab” as shown in Figure 2 below. Click on this link, and it does all of the work for you. Note that the Visual Studio toolbox only supports a single version of the tools to be displayed. When you run the Toolbox utility, it will remove any existing Infragistics Tab Groups from Visual Studio.
If for some reason the Toolbox Utility fails to install the tools into your toolbox, or you’re like me and want to do everything yourself, you can install the tools into the toolbox with drag and drop. Simply drag the controls from the install folder (typically c:\program files\Infragistics\NetAdvantage [version]\ASP.NET\bin) into the toolbox as shown in figure 3 below.
As a final option to add tools to the toolbox, you can use the “Choose Items” command in Visual Studio, which is visible on the toolbox’s context menu as shown in Figure 4 below. Once you launch the Choose Items dialog, you can pick controls from the populated list. I usually save this option for my ‘last resort’ because the Choose Items dialog can take a long time to load sometimes.
The Upgrade Utility will be your best friend when it comes to moving an application from one version of the NetAdvantage tools to another version. The utility can handle minor hotfix upgrades, or major volume release upgrades. You can run the Upgrade Utility as a standalone application or it can be installed as an add-in for use inside of Visual Studio. I generally use it as a stand-alone application, but here are the steps to install the Visual Studio add-in.
If you’re using Visual Studio 2008, you’re done! The add-in is installed automatically when you install NetAdvantage. If you’re using Visual Studio 2005, you may have to run the install manually.
Navigate to the NetAdvantage for .NET Tools folder in the Windows Start Menu as indicated in Figure 5 below. Clicking on the “Project Upgrade AddIn” link will open an HTML file, with a link to run the installer.
Application Styling offers an easy way to style applications at a global scale, without working down at the bit level. Application Styling enables you to create re-usable styles that can be designed separate from any development effort, making it a true separation between designer and developer. Whether you’re a developer or a designer, Application Styling makes the task of styling an application easier than ever.
For ASP.NET Application Styling is controlled through the web.config file for a particular site. You can add the tags and attributes manually by hand, or use the Application Styling add-in which gives you a GUI to manipulate the settings.
If you’re using Visual Studio 2008, this add-in is installed by default when you install the product. If you’re using older versions of Visual Studio, you may need to manually install the add-in. If you want to check if you have the add-in installed, open Visual Studio and click on the “Tools” menu. You should see “Application Styling Configuration” at the top of the menu. If the item is not displayed, you’ll want to manually install the add-in. To do so, navigate to the NetAdvantage AppStylist for .NET folder in your Start Menu, and click on the Application Styling Configuration AddIn link as shown in Figure 6 below. The link will open up an HTML document which has a step by step guide for installing the add-in.
With NetAdvantage installed and setup, you’re ready to explore the tools. You can run the samples by navigating to the “Experience NetAdvantage for .NET” item in the Start Menu as shown in Figure 7.
You can also visit the online samples hosted at http://samples.infragistics.com
To get started with NetAdvantage, you’ll want to create a new project. Visual Studio will give you a choice between a creating a File System WebSite or a Web Application. I recommend using a WebSite, since it more likely than not mirrors your deployment environment closer than if you chose to build a WebApplication. There are a couple of key differences to think about. If you’re using a file system WebSite, you don’t have the option to include resources from Virtual Directories. Believe it or not, this is a good thing. When it comes time to deploy your application, a file system WebSite can be xcopy deployed. A WebApplication on the other hand, may require you to setup external virtual directories which could be an impossible task if you’re working with a hosting service.
When I create a new WebSite, the first thing I do is enable Application Styling in my site. From inside of Visual Studio, go to the Tools menu, click on “Application styling Configuration”. You’ll be presented with the Application Styling Configuration Dialog seen below in Figure 8.
At this point, you have Application Styling enabled. Any Infragistics WebControl added to any form in this WebSite will now be styled according to the StyleSet you chose in the steps above. To add one of the Infragistics tools to your form, simply drag the control from the toolbox onto your form. Alternatively, you can double click a tool in the toolbox to add it to your form.
To learn more about Application Styling, take a look at the Application Styling topic in the help file.
After building an application, the next logical step would be deployment. Deployment is a straight forward process, but there are a few things I’ll point out. I’ve already recommended you use a file system WebSite when developing your application. If you’ve followed my recommendation, you can use XCopy deployment as specified below. Otherwise, you’ll want to use the Alternative method.
Do not run the NetAdvantage installer on your web server. The installer is meant to be run on a development machine, and will put unnecessary files and registry keys on your web server.
Starting with Visual Studio 2005, The Javascript files that the Infragistics WebControls use for client-side functionality are all embedded directly into the assemblies. Because of this, there is no need for you to manually deploy Javascript files or set up a virtual directory for Javascript resources for the Infragistics Assemblies.
Step 1: Create a zip file of your website. Step 2: Copy the Infragistics dlls from the Install folder (ie. C:\Program Files\Infragistics\NetAdvantage for .NET 2008 Vol. 3 CLR 3.5\ASP.NET\Bin) into the zip archive’s bin directory. Or Install the Infragistics dlls into the web server’s Global Assembly Cache (GAC). Note: You could alternatively copy the dlls into the bin directory before zipping up the website, but you’ll need to delete those assemblies before opening Visual Studio the next time. This is due to a long standing issue involving how the Visual Studio designer resolves assembly references. Step 3: Copy the zip archive to your web server and extract the Contents.
Create a zip file of your website.
Copy the Infragistics dlls from the Install folder (ie. C:\Program Files\Infragistics\NetAdvantage for .NET 2008 Vol. 3 CLR 3.5\ASP.NET\Bin) into the zip archive’s bin directory.
Or
Install the Infragistics dlls into the web server’s Global Assembly Cache (GAC).
Note: You could alternatively copy the dlls into the bin directory before zipping up the website, but you’ll need to delete those assemblies before opening Visual Studio the next time. This is due to a long standing issue involving how the Visual Studio designer resolves assembly references.
Copy the zip archive to your web server and extract the Contents.
Step 1: Create a zip file of your website. Step 2: Copy the Infragistics dlls from the Install folder (ie. C:\Program Files\Infragistics\NetAdvantage for .NET 2008 Vol. 3 CLR 3.5\ASP.NET\Bin) into the zip archive’s bin directory. * -or- Install the Infragistics dlls into the web server’s Global Assembly Cache (GAC). *Note: You could alternatively copy the dlls into the bin directory before zipping up the website, but you’ll need to delete those assemblies before opening Visual Studio the next time. This is due to a long standing issue involving how the Visual Studio designer resolves assembly references. Step 3: Copy the zip archive to your web server, and extract the contents. Step 4: Create ig_common virtual directory on your web server. * Step 5: Copy Infragistics image directory (eg. C:\Program Files\Infragistics\NetAdvantage for .NET 2008 Vol. 3 CLR 3.5\ASP.NET\Images) into the virtual directory you have just created (ie. /ig_common/images) * * Note: This step is not necessary if you’re using Application Styling and have copied the StyleSet to a subdirectory of your WebSite (default). This is only necessary if you’re not using application styling, and you’re Web Site project was created as a Visual Studio Web Application using IIS.
Copy the Infragistics dlls from the Install folder (ie. C:\Program Files\Infragistics\NetAdvantage for .NET 2008 Vol. 3 CLR 3.5\ASP.NET\Bin) into the zip archive’s bin directory. *
-or-
*Note: You could alternatively copy the dlls into the bin directory before zipping up the website, but you’ll need to delete those assemblies before opening Visual Studio the next time. This is due to a long standing issue involving how the Visual Studio designer resolves assembly references.
Copy the zip archive to your web server, and extract the contents.
Create ig_common virtual directory on your web server. *
Copy Infragistics image directory (eg. C:\Program Files\Infragistics\NetAdvantage for .NET 2008 Vol. 3 CLR 3.5\ASP.NET\Images) into the virtual directory you have just created (ie. /ig_common/images) *
* Note: This step is not necessary if you’re using Application Styling and have copied the StyleSet to a subdirectory of your WebSite (default). This is only necessary if you’re not using application styling, and you’re Web Site project was created as a Visual Studio Web Application using IIS.