Support for Web Components and Angular 2.0 (Preview)

Spreadsheet (Beta)

The public Beta preview of the Kendo UI Spreadsheet supports the following features:

•  Formulas
• Filtering
• Sorting
• Data load/save from JSON via API methods
• Client Export to Excel
• Formatting
• Keyboard Navigation & Selection
• Editing
• Visual Styling
• Scrolling and Frozen panes
• DataSource Data Binding (applicable for grid-like ‘edit all rows’ scenarios)
•  Data Entry validation/error handling

App Templates and Visual Studio Integration

DataViz Features and Nova Theme

Bootstrap Theme Converter

Server Wrappers

ASP.NET MVC Wrappers

Scheduler Scaffolding

Private NuGet Server and Feed

Integration with Telerik Document Processing Library

ASP.NET vNext Support

What Else?

Release Webinar

Quick Links

Got Feedback?

We are happy to announce the arrival of the latest Telerik WPF and Silverlight components in the last major release for this year—Q3 2015. A detailed list of all new features can be found in our What’s New sections for WPF and Silverlight. All other details are included in our thorough release notes here for WPF and here for Silverlight.

New Controls

DesktopAlert (Official)

RadDesktopAlert for WPF will display a small pop-up window on the desktop to notify the user that a specific event in the application has occurred.

TimeSpanPicker (Beta)

The new RadTimeSpanPicker for WPF enables your end users to easily pick timespan values in desktop applications. The control provides full control over time and duration in any desktop app.

New Features

All Controls

Multiple private methods of QueryableCollectionView have been updated to protected in order to support inheritance.

DataServiceDataSource

Support for NuGet package which targets OData v4. Telerik.Windows.Controls.DataServices60 assembly is built against OData v4 corresponding binary—Microsoft.Data.Services.Client. Its version is 6.13.0 and all a customer needs to do is to update the references to be the same latest version of the OData assemblies.

ImageEditor

Introduced support for GIF and TIFF import/export and ICO import.

PdfProcessing

Introduced API for exporting PDF documents to plain text.

RibbonView for WPF

Now RadRibbonView supports keyboard navigation where the active element is highlighted once the KeyTips are activated. This feature allows users to navigate through all items inside the RadRibbonView simply by using the ArrowKeys (Left/Right/Top/Down). Users also can execute the action associated with the element which is currently focused by using the Space/Enter keys.   

TreeView

Implemented Multiple Selection mode which is consistent with the same mode in RadListBox, RadGridView, etc. Multiple Selection refers to Selecting/Deselecting items with a single ​mouse click or a single space key press. Until Q3 2015 Extended and Multiple Selection had the same behavior.

WordsProcessing for WPF

RTF Format Provider: Implemented omitting of color definitions in the color table, if a color is set to "auto" or "transparent."

HTML Format Provider: Introduced support for downloading image data only on demand when importing an image with URI source.

You can download the latest bits for WPF and Silverlight and see everything by yourselves. You can enjoy our WPF and Silverlight demos and share your thoughts through our Forums or our Ideas & Feedback portal. 

Gauges

AutoCompleteTextView (Beta)

DataForm - It’s Official!

• Place the properties labels above the editors
  
• Place the properties labels on the left of the editors, visually detaching these labels from the editors themselves
  
• Set the properties labels inline
  

Chart

Swift 2.0 Support in Xcode 7

iOS7 Support 

DataForm Out of Beta!

With Q2 2015 we introduced a new control in UI for Android called DataForm. The control, also known as PropertyGrid, is the perfect component for editing the properties of a business object during runtime. All you have to do is provide the DataForm with an entity (business object), and the control will automatically generate editors for each public member. The DataForm offers built-in editors for each of the available primitive types—numbers, strings, booleans and enumerations. With this release the DataForm is no longer in beta which means you can start incorporating it in your production apps. 

One addition to the DataForm is the inclusion of a new default editor—NumberPicker. The NumberPicker is a new control that allows users to select numeric values from within a predefined range.

If you want to learn more about what additional features the DataForm offers, read this article. 

New Features in the ListView

One of the newest additions to the ListView is the slide layout. It is a new layout strategy that improves the experience while scrolling through the ListView items. This feature is perfect for enabling picture browsing-like experience in any Android app. The behavior of this feature closely resembles what we currently have in the SlideView control for Windows Phone. 

Take a look at the full code example for the SlideLayoutManager.  

Another feature we managed to include is the ability to display the ListView items in a wrapped fashion.

Take a look at the full code example for the WrapLayoutManager.

The last addition to the ListView is ability to stick section headers to the top of the scrollable list.

Take a look at the full code example for the StickyHeaderBehavior.

JSON Support in DataSource

The DataSource can consume various data—from arrays with simple items and business objects, to dictionaries coming from various sources. With this release the DataSource can get its data from web services that return data in JSON format.

If you have already hopped on the train of developing Windows 10 applications then you’ll definitely enjoy the news that we are introducing a new suite with the Q3 2015 release of Telerik DevCraft—UI for Universal Windows Platform (UWP).

Compatibility with the Universal Windows Platform

It is my pleasure to announce that we have extended the majority of our Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1 controls to be compatible with the latest Universal Windows Platform that is part of Windows 10. This means that you can use them for creating Windows 10 applications, share a single codebase and run on a multitude of Microsoft devices. The controls utilize the adaptive layout approach exposed by the platform. The bundle contains 20 controls, everything from the fastest ListView on the market and DataForm to data visualization controls like Chart, BulletGraph and Gauges. There's also a Map, a Calendar and a number of input pickers and navigation controls.

Here’s the full list of controls in alphabetical order.

• AutoCompleteBox 
• BulletGraph 
• BusyIndicator 
• Calendar
• Chart 
• DataForm 
• DataStorage
• Date picker
• Expander
• Gauge 
• HubTile 
• ListView 
• Map
• NumericBox 
• Pagination 
• RadialMenu 
• RangeSlider 
• Rating
• SideDrawer
• Time picker

The controls above have been bundled in a new product called “UI for Universal Windows Platform” and should not be mistaken with our existing offering “UI for Windows Universal.” 

Coming soon... DataGrid!

As you might have correctly guessed, the biggest missing piece from the list above is the DataGrid. We recognize the need for such control and the role it plays in data driven applications. That’s why we will use the upcoming months to reevaluate its design and make it more compliant with the latest mobile design guidelines. Once we do that we’ll include the control in the product bundle. Let us know which DataGrid features you consider most important in the feedback portal. This will help us better prioritize our tasks.

In the meantime, the available ListView control is a perfect substitute for similar scenarios—it can work with large sets of data, supports grouping, sorting and filtering, and offers various layout definitions and much more. 

A DataForm is Already Included

Indeed, we reworked the DataForm for Windows 8.1 and Windows Phone 8.1 to be compatible with the UWP, which means that you can use it in your Windows 10 apps. It supports inline icons in the default property editors as well.

Why the Community ​Tech ​Preview (CTP) ​Label?!

The reason is that we are still polishing the controls to be even more compliant with the Universal Windows Platform. Our ultimate goal is to have the most complete and most advanced suite for Windows 10, Xbox and UWP-based IoT development on the market. The new UI bundle is suitable for testing and production purposes ​though, so we urge you to download UI for UWP by clicking on the link below, play with the bits and let us know what you think in the comments or our feedback portal. All the feedback will be highly appreciated.

DataForm for Xamarin.Forms

Gauges for Xamarin.iOS

AutoCompleteTextView (Beta) for Xamarin.iOS

NumberPicker for Xamarin.Android

Chart for Xamarin.iOS 

Using Kendo UI in a Meteor Application

By combining Kendo UI’s rich user interface widgets with the Meteor JS app platform, you gain a robust stack for building a complete JS app quickly. But, you might not know how to use Kendo UI with Meteor. So, in this article, I will lay out the necessary steps for using Kendo UI (Core or Pro) within a Meteor application.

If you need to get up to speed (i.e. installing) on Meteor, in the context of Kendo UI, have a look at my “Build & Deploy Rich UI JavaScript Apps, FAST!” article.

The instructions that follow for getting Kendo UI to work with Meteor differs for Kendo UI Core v.s. Kendo UI Professional. Thus, this article is broken down into two different sets of instructions. First we’ll look at adding Kendo UI Core to Meteor and then adding Kendo UI Professional to Meteor.

Adding Kendo UI Core to Meteor

Step 1. Create Meteor App

Create a Meteor application by running:

$ meteor create meteor+kendo-core

This will create a folder (i.e. meteor+kendo-core) with the following sub-folders and files on your local system:

├── .meteor├── meteor+kendo-core.css├── meteor+kendo-core.html└── meteor+kendo-core.js

Then change directories (i.e. $ cd meteor+kendo-core) into the created meteor application directory (i.e. meteor+kendo-core) and run:

$ meteor

You should now have a running meteor application at localhost:3000.

Step 2. Add Kendo UI Atmosphere Package

Go to atmosphere and select which theme you would like to install.

Let’s assume you want to install the default theme.

From the command line, in the meteor+kendo-core directory, run the following command:

$ meteor add telerik:kendo-ui-core-default-theme

This will install the telerik:kendo-ui-core-default-theme package locally.

Step 3. Use Kendo UI

Use Kendo UI Core in your application.

Open meteor+kendo-core.css and remove everything in this file. Paste in the following and save the file:

.demo-sectionp{
    margin:0030px;
    line-height: 50px;
}.demo-sectionp.k-button{
    margin:010px00;
}.k-primary{
    min-width: 150px;
}

Open meteor+kendo-core.html and remove everything in this file. Paste in the following and save the file:

<head><title>meteor+kendo-core</title></head><body><divclass="demo-section k-header"><div><h4>Basic Button</h4><p><buttonid="primaryTextButton"class="k-primary">Primary Button</button><buttonid="textButton">Button</button></p></div><div><h4>Disabled buttons</h4><p><aid="primaryDisabledButton"class="k-primary">Disabled Primary Button</a><aid="disabledButton">Disabled Button</a></p></div><div><h4>Buttons with icons</h4><p><aid="iconTextButton">Filter</a><aid="kendoIconTextButton">Clear Filter</a><emid="iconButton"><spanclass="k-sprite">Refresh</span></em></p></div></div></body>

Open meteor+kendo-core.js and remove everything in this file. Paste in the following and save the file:

if(Meteor.isClient) {
    $(document).ready(function() {
        $("#primaryTextButton").kendoButton();

        $("#textButton").kendoButton();

        $("#primaryDisabledButton").kendoButton({
            enable: false
        });

        $("#disabledButton").kendoButton({
            enable: false
        });

        $("#iconTextButton").kendoButton({
            spriteCssClass: "k-icon k-i-funnel"
        });

        $("#kendoIconTextButton").kendoButton({
            icon: "funnel-clear"
        });

        $("#iconButton").kendoButton({
            spriteCssClass: "k-icon k-i-refresh"
        });
    });
}

if(Meteor.isServer) {
    Meteor.startup(function() {
        // code to run on server at startup
    });
}

You should now see a Kendo UI Core widget in the page at localhost:3000.

Adding Kendo UI Professional to Meteor

If you are coding along make sure you first kill the previous running Meteor application. We’ll be creating a new Meteor application in this section of the article.

Step 1. Create Meteor App

Create a Meteor application by running:

$ meteor create meteor+kendo-pro

This will create a folder (i.e. meteor+kendo-pro) with the following sub-folders and files on your local system:

├── .meteor├── meteor+kendo-pro.css├── meteor+kendo-pro.html└── meteor+kendo-pro.js

Then, change directories (i.e. $ cd meteor+kendo-pro) into the created meteor application directory (i.e. meteor+kendo-pro) and run:

$ meteor

You should now have a running meteor application at localhost:3000.

Step 2. Create Custom Package Directory & package.js File

In the new meteor application folder create a folder called packages (might already be there if you are trying to add Kendo UI to an existing project). Inside of the packages folder add a a folder called kendo-ui-pro. Inside of the kendo-ui-pro folder add a file called package.js (see package.js docs for additional details).

├── meteor+kendo-pro.css├── meteor+kendo-pro.html├── meteor+kendo-pro.js└── packages
    └── kendo-ui-pro
        └── package.js

Step 3. Add Kendo UI Source to Package

Grab the Kendo UI Professional source code by logging into your Telerik account and downloading the source. Then, place the Kendo UI Professional source code inside of the kendo-ui-pro folder.

Below is a directory tree of what this will look like depending on the Kendo UI Professional source code version used.

├── meteor+kendo-pro.css├── meteor+kendo-pro.html├── meteor+kendo-pro.js└── packages
    └── kendo-ui-pro
        ├── package.js└── telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial├── README
            ├── changelog.html├── examples
            ├── js
            ├── license-agreements
            ├── src
            ├── styles
            ├── typescript
            └── vsdoc

Step 4. Create/Define Custom Package

Open the package.js file you created and add the following JavaScript. Note that the package.js file defines the correct paths to the Kendo UI Professional files.

Package.describe({
  name: 'kendo-ui-pro',
  version: '2015.2.814'
});

Package.onUse(function(api) {
  api.versionsFrom('1.1.0.3'); //meteor dependencyapi.use('jquery', 'client'); //jQuery dependency

  //Then add this packages files...
  
  //jsapi.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/src/js/kendo.all.js', 'client');

  //css web and dataVizapi.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/kendo.common.min.css', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/kendo.default.min.css', 'client');

  //mobile cssapi.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/src/styles/mobile/kendo.mobile.all.css', 'client');

  //global CSS fontsapi.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/images/kendoui.ttf', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/images/kendoui.woff', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/src/styles/mobile/images/kendoui.woff', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/src/styles/mobile/images/kendoui.ttf', 'client');

  //global CSS  sprites imagesapi.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/images/back.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/images/kendoui.svg', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/images/wp8_icons.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/images/wp8_inverseicons.png', 'client');

  //global CSS texturesapi.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/brushed-metal.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots1.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots2.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots3.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots4.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots5.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots6.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots7.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots8.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots9.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots10.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots11.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots12.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/dots13.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/glass-lighter.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/glass.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/highlight.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/hsv-gradient.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/hue.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/leather1.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/leather2.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/noise.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/stripe1.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/stripe2.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/stripe3.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/stripe4.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/stripe5.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/stripe6.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/transparency.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/textures/transtexture.png', 'client');

  //theme imagesapi.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/editor.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/imagebrowser.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/indeterminate.gif', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/loading-image.gif', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/loading.gif', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/loading_2x.gif', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/slider-h.gif', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/slider-v.gif', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/sprite.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/sprite_2x.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/sprite_kpi.png', 'client');
  api.add_files('telerik.kendoui.professional.2015.2.814.commercial/styles/Default/sprite_kpi_2x.png', 'client');
});

Step 5. Add Kendo UI Pro Package to App

When all the paths are correct, from your meteor project directory, run the following meteor command:

$ meteor add kendo-ui-pro

Step 6. Use Kendo UI Pro

Use Kendo UI Professional in your application.

Open meteor+kendo-pro.css and remove everything in this file. Paste in the following and save the file:

.customer-photo{
    display: inline-block;
    width: 32px;
    height: 32px;
    border-radius: 50%;
    background-size:32px35px;
    background-position: center center;
    vertical-align: middle;
    line-height: 32px;
    box-shadow: inset 001px#999, inset 0010pxrgba(0,0,0,.2);
    margin-left: 5px;
}.customer-name{
    display: inline-block;
    vertical-align: middle;
    line-height: 32px;
    padding-left: 3px;
}

Open meteor+kendo-pro.html and remove everything in this file. Paste in the following and save the file:

<head><title>meteor+kendo-pro</title></head><body><divid="grid"></div></body>

Open meteor+kendo-pro.js and remove everything in this file. Paste in the following and save the file:

if (Meteor.isClient) {
        $(document).ready(function () {
            $("#grid").kendoGrid({
                dataSource: {
                    type: "odata",
                    transport: {
                        read: "//demos.telerik.com/kendo-ui/service/Northwind.svc/Customers"
                    },
                    pageSize: 20
                },
                height: 550,
                groupable: true,
                sortable: true,
                pageable: {
                    refresh: true,
                    pageSizes: true,
                    buttonCount: 5
                },
                columns: [{
                    template: "<div class='customer-photo'" +
                                    "style='background-image: url(../content/web/Customers/#:data.CustomerID#.jpg);'></div>" +
                                "<div class='customer-name'>#: ContactName #</div>",
                    field: "ContactName",
                    title: "Contact Name",
                    width: 240
                }, {
                    field: "ContactTitle",
                    title: "Contact Title"
                }, {
                    field: "CompanyName",
                    title: "Company Name"
                }, {
                    field: "Country",
                    width: 150
                }]
            });
        });
}

if (Meteor.isServer) {
    Meteor.startup(function() {
        // code to run on server at startup
    });
}

You should now see a Kendo UI ​Professional widget in the page at localhost:3000.

The combination of Meteor and Kendo UI Core gives any developer all the required tools to build a modern web application for free (professional hosting excluded). When that application needs professional UI widgets (grids, editors, etc.), simply remove the Kendo UI core package from Atmosphere and add the Kendo UI professional code by creating a custom local package. Now go build an app… fast!

Sam Basu guides us through a hands-on guide on getting started with Telerik Report Server.

Reporting is an essential part of many Enterprise workflows. With today's mobile app lifestyle and cloud services, you may think data is ubiquitous for consumption. That's until the C-level executives or Sales folks in your company demand to see fancy weekly reports generated out of data, sitting either on-premises or in cloud storage. On top of stringent formatting requirements, they demand someplace to manage reports behind a safe authentication and the ability to view reports from any device. Don't bang your head against the wall. Bite the bullet and deliver what's needed. The right tools will make all the difference.

Enter Telerik Report Server—your one-stop shop for professional report management. This article unpacks Report Server for you. Let's start!

Setting Up

Report Server comes bundled up as a lightweight web application that you get to download and run on your local web server.

First, head over to the download page and grab the installer, by clicking on the big red button. Alternatively, if you already have a Telerik DevCraft subscription, Report Server can also be downloaded from your Telerik Control Panel. This may also be a good time to check ​the System Requirements before proceeding.



Once you begin installing Report Server, make note of where you unpack the bits. This is the file location where your Report Server installation will run from.



Sit back and let the installer do its thing. Notice how it is trying to configure your local IIS in the process​—you can manually change configurations later, but Report Server offers you a nice default setup.



When the install finishes, take a pe​ek into the files that come with Report Server. As you can see, they include the assets to run a web application​—you may look, but you don’t need to change anything.

Configuration

Next up, open up your local IIS Manager to see what’s been done for you (the screenshot below shows IIS 8 on my Windows 10 machine).

Report Server comes in the form of a simple web application and it has been pre-configured to run as a separate website Telerik Report Server on its own Application Pool.

Check your Site Bindings in the IIS Manager. Report Server simply runs on a open HTTP port like 80 or 83. Click on Browse:xx or point your browser to http://localhost:<port#> and Report Server comes up.

Before you rejoice however, you need to realize the first time you run Report Server is of pivotal importance. That’s because you get to set up the Admin user the first time around​—this user can later add other Admins or regular users. So, make note of the credentials as you register the Admin user.

Everyday Usage

BUILD YOUR REPOSITORY

Report Server is meant to be hosted via an on-premise web server or in the cloud. It starts out running locally in your machine’s IIS, ready for you to push to a production URL for access. Before you do so, however, it may be worth trying out a few everyday workings of the Report Server from the user’s standpoint.

In the standalone Report Designer that comes with Report Server, serialization/deserialization of the report definition is done with a specific brand of XML. Reports have a .TRDX extension. If you already have Telerik Reporting installed, you’ll find a lot of sample .TRDX reports in the corresponding Examples folder, which offer an easy way to play with Report Server. Alternatively, once you have Report Server running, just hit the New Report button from the dashboard​—this downloads the Report Designer and you can create reports from scratch.



Click the Upload link from the Dashboard menu, pick a .TRDX report and off you go.

Once Report Server has picked up your report, it shows up as a line item in its report collection. Once selected, several menu options light up.

REPORT VIEWING

Go ahead and hit the Preview link, or just double click on the report. Report Server opens up a browser window or tab, and shows you a preview of the report. The report view is complete with readability, navigation, download and print options.



Now, if you were the regular user of this Report Server solution, you would want the flexibility to open up reports from any device—including mobile ones, right? Go ahead and resize your browser window to simulate smaller devices, like tablets or smartphones. As the screen real estate shrinks, you’ll see Report Server adjusts the report layout continuously. A Hamburger menu even shows up when the screen is too small for the standard navigation. The responsive design of these reports means that you can deliver your reports to any device!

REPORT MANAGEMENT

Want to edit a report, instead of just viewing it? No problem—simply select the report and hit the Edit link on the Dashboard. The standalone Telerik Report Designer will download if you don't have it and then open up in Desktop mode. The Report Designer offers the user a rich WYSIWYG editor to customize existing reports with data binding and a variety of formatting options.

Once you get the hang of it, it’s easy to play around with reports in Report Server—simply upload and deliver. Alternatively, with the stand-alone desktop Report Designer which is hooked up to your Report Server, users can simply add/edit reports locally and changes show up server-side automatically upon saving the reports. The user interface is simple enough for even your non-technical users to be able to store and manage reports without difficulty.

SCHEDULING

Now, having a report management system is nice, but you still get constant demands on scheduled report delivery. Your sales folks want daily trip reports or your CEO wants a weekly summary. Report Server helps you automate all such demands through robust Scheduling options.

Simply select a report and choose the Scheduling option from the top menu.

You get to set up a scheduling Task to deliver the chosen report in a variety of document formats.

You also get a wide array of choices for task recurrence for the chosen report. Keep in mind, each report is driven by its backend data source and the task runs at scheduled times. So your users get a fresh report delivered to them that pulls in the latest data.



You get full granularity to control the occurrence of the scheduling task. Flexibility FTW!



Once you set up a task, you can see it from your Reports or Schedules dashboard.



Now, who gets these scheduled reports? That’s something you get to decide through Subscribers.



Subscribers can be regular Report Server users or external folks with an email address. You get to control mail and SMTP settings from Configuration options.

Flexibility

Vanilla report storage and management can be no fun. You will be faced with the challenges of grouping reports, streamlining storage and managing users, along with fine-grained control to reports. Fortunately, Report Server offers a wide array of flexibility options.

A decision you have to make up-front is where you want Report Server to store all its reports and metadata for management. Report Server allows easy Storage Configuration to help you choose where you want your storage of reports. Your options are the local file system or Microsoft SQL Server and Redis through data connections. There is no right answer here—it all depends on your needs.

As you start dealing with lots and lots of reports, you’ll invariably want to group reports into logical buckets. This allows for better organization and controlling access to report groups by individual or by collections of users. Report Server allows you to define any number of Categories and manage new/existing reports into respective categories.



The very first user (likely yourself) that you set up in Report Server is the Super User, and beyond that you get robust User Management. Simply navigate to User Management and select an existing user to see the list of options. You get fine-grained control over user permissions towards access control on a specific report or a collection of reports through Categories.



As you set up new users of your Report Server, you can grant them specific User Roles and then control the permissions on a per report or category basis. You also can set up System Administrators, who can manage other users, or Data Administrators, who control storage configuration, along with who gets read/write access to reports.

Report Server, out of the box, supports the standard Forms Authentication. But what if your users do not like to remember one more User ID and Password? Relax. You can leverage the WS Federation standard to authenticate your users. This immediately opens up doors for Active Directory or Azure AD authentication. Simply trust the established Identity Provider to get you a token once the user is authenticated, and then proceed with regular Report Server access rights.

Here’s how you set up WS Federation authentication in Report Server. Simply head over to Configuration | Authentication and provide basic information, like WS Metadata URI, Relaying Party ID (your Report Server installation), the Authority URL that issues the token and the unique Client ID.

Once set up correctly, your users will have the option of signing in through AD credentials, on top of the regular Report Server authentication. It’s ok to rejoice.

Conclusion

Report storage and management is tricky business for most enterprises. Sure you can roll out a home-grown solution, but the enormous efforts needed to build ​high-performing, responsive and robust management features far outweigh the benefits.

Report Server comes with everything you expect right out of the box. You get to manage storage, retrieval and delivery of reports from any device the users bring to the table. And you also get the flexibility to fine-tune report categorization and storage configurations, on top of robust user management. You’ll love having Report Server on your side.

Based on information from Telerik Analytics, Schneider Electric's software development team embarked on a refresh of their product's user interface. Here is the story of how they successfully created an optimal user experience for their customers.

Scott Kingsley is the Software Development Manager for Schneider Electric’s Data Center Infrastructure Management (DCIM), a solution that is widely used by facilities and IT managers to analyze, operate, plan and optimize their data centers. He wanted to improve the experience of DCIM’s users, but at first his team lacked the data to understand ​the best way to do ​it.

Kingsley’s team used Telerik Analytics for about three years to gain an understanding of how data center managers use its DCIM solution. Based on the usage insights they gathered, the team then embarked on a refresh of the application’s user interface (UI) to enhance the user experience.

Usage insights provided by Telerik Analytics help determine the value of each feature, and how much screen real estate to devote to that feature on the UI. As Kingsley’s software development team worked on their UI refresh, Kingsley wanted to use a prepackaged widget library and decided to leverage the power of Kendo UI to create an optimal user experience.

Since using the Kendo UI framework to revamp the UI, Schneider Electric’s data center infrastructure management application has gained numerous recognitions from industry experts. Recently, in Gartner's first-ever Magic Quadrant for DCIM tools, Schneider Electric was named as a Leader in the category. 

“I attribute our success with the solution in large part to our use of Telerik solutions,” said Kingsley.

Read the whole story here.

 Learn more about our products:

• Kendo UI
  
• Telerik Platform
• Telerik Analytics

What’s in the Box?

This release is a big milestone for us, as we’ve added report scheduling to the Telerik Report Server. This is one of the most requested features and we’re very happy we could deliver it in such a short timeframe. We also added capabilities to the report storage and management along with user management, which lets you use active directory credentials to log in. All together this makes access to the reports far more seamless and secure for those that need them, whether in your company or for your clients. Don’t forget we’ve built this with a responsive web design, so you can load and manage reports from any device. Find out more on what’s new here.

Report Scheduling

Yes, it’s true; you can now schedule reports to run automatically. You can even add an unlimited number of recipients to each scheduled task, and they’ll receive the report right in their mailbox.

Setting a scheduled task is very easy, and once set you have a few options to track it. You can create a task while in the reports view for a selected report, or go to the scheduling module and start from there.

For a new task, you need to specify:

• The report that will run
• The format it’ll be saved in: PDF, Excel, Word, TIFF, RTF, CSV, PowerPoint, Web Archive, XPS
• The date the task will run
• The recurrence, defined by setting the repeat period to daily, weekly, monthly, yearly or once (and when the task recurrence should end)

You can monitor a task you’ve created in its activity panel. There you’ll see when the task runs, along with the documents created as a result and when they were created. The generated report documents are saved in the Report Server storage that you choose when you configure it.

If you want the generated report to be automatically distributed to stakeholders, colleagues or clients, you can add as many recipients as you want to the scheduled task subscribers list. They can be both Report Server registered users and external one-time entries.

For the automatic emails to be sent to the report recipients, you need to make a one-time configuration in the Report Server settings to specify your mail server properties. You can find more information in the documentation.

AD FS Support

We know that most companies prefer their employees to use their domain credentials to log into any application used internally by the company. It’s more secure, easier to manage by IT and simpler for the end user as they won’t need to create and remember separate accounts for each app. With this release, Telerik Report Server provides that option. In addition to the local (WebForms) account support, we provide authentication option through the Web Services Federation (WS-Federation) specification. Now you can easily configure the Report Server to use a Federation provider to log in. Currently we support:

• Active Directory for Windows Domain
• Azure AD

Find out more on how to set it up here.

What’s Next?

More and more exciting staff is coming. First, we will enhance the scheduling functionality by adding the ability to set report parameters for the scheduled task through a nice UI that’s easy to use. This will allow you to best leverage the report parameters functionality and reuse the same report definition multiple times. We will also add the ability to customize the email template that’s sent to the scheduled task subscribers with the generated report. When we’re ready with these features, we will release them immediately.

A full roadmap will be available on the Report Server page by the end of the month, so stay tuned. To have a say on it, share your feedback and thoughts in our feedback portal or in the comments below.

P.S. Join Telerik developer advocates on October 14th to see technical demos of the DevCraft Q3 2015 release highlights. You’ll have a chance to win awesome prizes and get your questions answered live. Hope to see you there.

What is the most important thing when we design and create our apps?
 
Colors, shapes, design, feature list, architecture, implementation, code quality and somewhere there a simple thought crosses your mind—how is the user going to interact with my app? Is it intuitive enough? Is it smooth enough?
 
As an iOS dev you know how important is to make your app pretty and resemble the real world in behavior, while also being intuitive and convenient.

Well, so do we. This is exactly why we are building our components in a way that allows both a great experience with the stock feature set and an option for easy customization, so you can fully realize your own ideas.

In this post, we’re going to mix together one of our components, a couple of natural laws and a good bit of imagination—and see what happens.

Show More, Code Less—or TKSideDrawer in Action

Physics, Gravity and TKSideDrawer

• -(void) show
• -(void) dismiss

• UIGravityBehavior applies gravity to the added UIViews
• UICollisionBehavior handles the collision between objects or an object and a boundary (a screen boundary or such defined by us)

Of course, in order to run the project, you need UI for iOS. Get a free trial here.

Happy coding and... may the force be with you.

In Test Studio R3 2015, ​native Android ​support comes to Test Studio.

The wait is over for those who develop and test Android applications. The R3 release of Test Studio will support testing native Android applications. If you're just getting started with Test Studio, you may want to start with our ​handy guide, but for Android devs familiar with it we're going to dive right in.

Testing Android devices is a very involved process, due to the prevalent fragmentation issue and the manufacturer-specific Android setups being put on so many devices. There is a need for a testing solution that creates a more stable, polished app that will be robust enough to perform ​reliably across these Android variants.

Here are ​a few highlights from this latest release:

Test Studio Mobile:

• Automated testing for native Android applications. Create and run automated tests on real devices and emulators without writing a single line of code. Create tests once and execute them on multiple devices.

   

• Test lists: Create iOS and Android test lists, execute against connected devices in parallel.

   

• Connect your devices via USB or WiFi: We’ve added the ability to connect your iOS and Android devices directly via USB connection.

   

• With R3’s added USB support, Continuous Integration with Windows, MAC & Linux is supported.

   

• Drill-down results for Mobile Test Lists: We’ve added new UI that allows you to drill in to the test list, test and test step level. 

We made several improvements to Test Studio Web & Desktop solution as well. Please see the highlights below:

• Intellimap is now available in Visual Studio plug
• We made some performance optimizations for our Element Explorer
• Full TFS 2015 and Visual Studio 2015 compatibility
• Test Studio now supports Windows 10
• Scheduling—hourly and minutely recurring now available
• Scheduling optimization

For a detailed list of features and changes, please check out the release notes.

What Next?

To ​learn more about this release, please register here for our upcoming release webinar. Our product team will demo the new Record & Playback functionality for iOS and Android native applications along with the latest additions to Test Studio Web & Desktop.

If you're looking for a general guide to getting started with Report Server, 

The landscape for .NET developers is fast changing and now more than ever, you need the best possible tools to get your job done. Just in time comes the Telerik DevCraft Q3 2015 Release—packed with goodies to enable you to build the next generation of amazing applications for desktop, web and mobile.

Fall/Autumn is a time to get out and enjoy nature, not be holed up in your cubicle. Here’s to Telerik DevCraft helping you deliver projects on time and above expectations. Q3 was a big release and you know the right tools make all the difference.

Relive the Content

On Oct 14th, Telerik developer advocates Michael Crump, Sam Basu& Ed Charbeneau unpacked the Telerik DevCraft bits during the Q3 Release Webinar. For our worldwide audience, we tried covering the content in two time slots this time​—and it looks like it paid dividends for most audiences in conflicting time zones. If you could not make it, you can relive the webinar in its entirety—we now have high definition recording available!

Prize Winners

What’s a Telerik webinar without some awesome prizes? In tune with what’s hot in the Microsoft devices space, we had picked Surface Pro 3 and Xbox One—developers need to be productive everywhere and have fun as well, right? We picked four random winners among webinar attendees for each of the two time slots. You win just for showing up!

11 AM EST Timeslot Winners:
Xbox One​—Dave Scholl
Surface Pro 3—Mark Aydelotte

6 PM EST Timeslot Winners:
Xbox One—Eric Zhuang
Surface Pro 3—Tom Franklin

Congrats winners. Hope you enjoy your prizes!

Additional Questions/Answers

One of the most enjoyable aspects of the webinars for us advocates is the Q/A at the end. We appreciate developers looking at our latest tooling and coming up with real-world questions on usage or product features. While we try to answer as many questions as we can on air, there are just way too many to cover​—here are some additional questions and answers on the most appropriate queries and expanding on product roadmaps.

Mobile:

Q: Do you have any examples of real-world apps for native controls?
A: Yes, you can check out our Windows Phone App Showcase and our customer apps in the spotlight for iOS and Android.

Q: When will UWP UI Controls be available in the Telerik Control Panel?
A: Right now, the new UI for UWP suite is in CTP. As the product becomes official, we will add it to your Telerik Control Panel for easy downloading.

Q: Are you working on a Grid in UI for UWP?
A: If you check the Windows 10 UWP Controls roadmap, you will see that the Grid is our top priority for Windows 10. Other highly prioritized controls are the Image Editor and the design templates from UI for Windows Phone.

Q: Is there sample code for UI for Xamarin?
A: Yes, it is included when you download the UI for Xamarin control suite.

Desktop:

Q: How do I implement themes like you did for the RadTimeSpanPicker?
A: We have 15 themes that are currently available. You can learn how to use a theme HERE. Have fun.

Q: What is the main use of Icon Set for WPF?
A: To provide icons for your app so that you won't need to buy them elsewhere or hire a designer.

Q: Please elaborate on Desktop Alerts for WPF.
A: It allows you to display notifications on the desktop if a specific event occurs in your application. For example, a new e-mail message, meeting request or task request. It is displayed as a small pop-up on a predetermined location for a short period of time and will disappear shortly thereafter. Please look HERE for more info.

Q: Tell me more about the Medical Sample App for WinForms.
A: The Medical App demo shows how to integrate several Telerik components to build a real world scenario of a doctor-patient management system, allowing doctors to manage their patient records, visits and appointments. You can find it in the integration example in our WinForms demo application.

Q: Do the Telerik UWP controls play nicely with most of the open source MVVM frameworks (like MVVM Light) out there?
A: Yes. Just like UI for Windows Phone and UI for Windows Universal, UI for UWP uses standard XAML property bindings and commands, which makes it easy to use with an MVVM architecture.

Web:

Q: Is it possible to use Spreadsheet control on a server without Microsoft.Office.Interop.Excel DLL?
A: The new Spreadsheet widget in both UI for ASP.NET MVC and UI for ASP.NET Ajax are stand-alone UI components. They render HTML5-based spreadsheets in-browser and do not depend on any 3^rd party or Office components.

Q: What kind of apps can be developed using the Kendo UI framework?
A:Kendo UI is Telerik’s front-end HTML5, JS & CSS framework that aids in building modern web and mobile applications. Web applications built with Kendo UI can be for desktop or optimized for mobile. Kendo UI Mobile UI widgets can also be used to build Hybrid mobile apps for App store presence and full mobile device integration through Cordova plugins.

Q: Does the Web Components support in rendering Kendo UI widgets not work in IE/Edge?
A: Kendo UI embraces modern web technologies like Web Components and Angular 2. Keep in mind, however, that lot of these technologies have emerging specifications and not production-ready yet. As such support for upcoming specifications (like Custom elements, Shadow DOM etc. in Web Components) varies across browsers. Kendo UI simply wants to provide you with the most flexibility and acceptance of newer technologies should you wish to dabble.

Q: Can you explain the real benefit of MVC Scaffolding?
A: Kendo UI MVC Scaffolders for MVC Grid, Scheduler or Charts can be the developer’s best friends. The scaffolding solutions are meant to easily string together your Model, View and Controllers in an MVC application. Given a Model and Data Context, the scaffolding tools generate a lot of the plumbing code needed for seamless CRUD operations. This is code you would otherwise have to write by hand; the scaffolding tools simply give you a head start in the right direction.

Report Server:

Report Server has come a long way since introduction—consider it your one-stop shop for robust Report Management. This quarter, Report Server gained valuable features like Report Scheduling and WS Federation (AD FS) Authentication support.

The excitement for Report Server is palpable and we had a lot of questions from you all. To do it justice, the Report Server product team will take all the questions and make a separate blog post out of it. This will also answer your relevant doubts and spotlight some upcoming features coming up in the roadmap. Look out for it on the Report Server blog.

Resources

Webinar Recording - https://youtu.be/84iJN9EUDbs
Michael’s Deck - https://speakerdeck.com/mbcrump/devtools-q3-2015-webinar
Sam’s Deck - http://1drv.ms/1MXaubp
Ed’s Deck - http://1drv.ms/1Z7sgzg

That’s a Wrap

• Ability to customize the template of the items
• Predefined layouts
• Support for swipe content

Data Class

Item Template

Items State 

Layout 

Swipe Content 

Spreadsheet

The official release of the Excel-like component will offer the following ​important features:

• Add/Remove Columns and Rows
• Cell Formatting features like the following: Cut, Copy and Paste, Apply Border, Alignment, Text Wrapping, Increase and Decrease Decimal, Custom Formats
• Sorting and Filtering
• Data Validation
• Import/Export—CSV, JSON, Tab delimited text
• Conditional Formatting
• Scrolling and Pinned Headers/Columns
• Context Menu
• And more

Figure 1: RadSpreadSheet—the screenshot represents the features available only in the Beta.

Material Design Skin

The ASP.NET AJAX controls will get a new modern dress inspired by the popular Material Design of Google. The Material theme will feature depth effects such as lighting and shadows which will make your apps more vivid and interactive. You will be able to change the default theme colors through the Theme Builder app.
 

Figure 2: Light Green version of the Material Design Theme.

Theme Builder Improvements

The theme creator tool will ​continue to be improved with the addition of the remaining Telerik ASP.NET AJAX controls and some of the most popular themes like Silk, Glow, Metro and MetroTouch. Our long-term plans include adding new themes, like one similar to the default Kendo UI theme, that will be available for download from the app.

We will also research the possibility of providing wider support for conversion of Twitter Bootstrap themes, so that the developers can use the AJAX controls along with the Bootstrap widgets on the same page with the same look and feel.
 

 Figure ​3: Theme Builder app.

Accessibility Improvements

With the introduction of WAI-ARIA compatibility for RadAutoCompleteBox, RadButton, RadWindow, RadAlert, RadConfirm and RadPrompt, you will be able to build more accessible and usable web projects, especially for people who rely on screen readers and who cannot use a mouse.

Easy-to-Use Separate Button Components

• Easier configuration​—there will be a server tag for each button type (PushButton, ImageButton, LinkButton, etc..) and fewer properties to achieve the same level of functionality as with RadButton
• Performance optimization
• Infrastructure for new button types for Q2 2016: button list, switch button, split button and more
• We won't remove the parent RadButton and your updated apps will continue to function properly as before

Label Control

You will be able replace the standard ASP.NET Label within your web projects with a label control with the same look and feel as the rest of the Telerik ASP.NET AJAX controls. It will offer seamless integration with all components in the suite, along with rich feature server and client-side API for creating various captions for form editors. Its flexibility will allow you to specify the layout and positioning, as well as to customize its inner contents by adding icons and/or hyperlinks.

Chart Pan and Zoom

The long anticipated pan and zoom feature will help you and your end-users navigate through and zoom into or out of the RadHtmlChart.
 

Figure ​4: Use SHIFT + Mouse Drag Region Selection combination on mouse-enabled devices to zoom in data for a specific period of time

Responsive Toolbar

The responsive capabilities of the toolbar will allow you and your end-users to operate with its UI elements on small screen sizes like tablets or even smartphones. If there is not enough space the right placed tools will become part of the dropdown button context menu, as shown in the second screenshot.

Modern Rendering

The CloudUpload, DataForm, Gantt, MediaPlayer, ImageGallery, LightBox, ProgressBar, SiteMap, Spell, TagCloud and Wizard control will obtain light-weight and semantic rendering based on the latest trends in HTML5, CSS3 and font-icons, which will improve not only the appearance of your apps, but also their performance.

With the launch of Xcode 7 we were offered a sweet deal of cool new features like free on-device development, Swift 2.0, Objective-C upgrades, and some sugar in testing and debugging.

Yeah great, but if you had developed with Xcode 7 for a bit longer you would have probably noticed that in order to use a third party library, you now have to manually add the search path to it. It’s not that hard, but when you have to do it often it becomes annoying. ​This was kind of a pain for my team and our clients as well. Before Xcode 7 Framework Search Paths were filled automatically, but with the update this changed. A lot of our clients ​were surprised and inconvenienced by the requirement to fill Framework Search Paths manually now.

In order to satisfy our clients and ease their pain, we started looking for a solution to this search paths issue. Soon we came up with the idea to create a custom project template with added search paths and link to the framework.

However, most of the information on this topic is outdated. Basically almost all public articles are covering the project templates in Xcode 4, and you definitely need to spend some time searching around the web to get all the information you need.

After struggling with this myself, I decided to write this post and synthesize the steps to create a custom project template for Xcode 7, so that it could be easier for all of you. Enjoy!

Explore What's ​Already There!

First, let’s take a look into the Xcode file structure and the default project templates.

Go in Applications, find the Xcode icon, right-click and choose Open Package Contents.

Тhis path leads to the Mac OS project templates:

/Developer/Library/Xcode/Templates/Project Templates/Mac

and this one to the iOS project templates:

/Developer/Platforms/iPhoneOS.platform/Developer/Library/Xcode/Templates/Project Templates/iOS

Before we dive in, let’s set some goals here. First, we are going to build a project template which resembles the Single View Application template provided by Apple. ​After that we'll talk about customizations.

Alright, let’s see what is going on in the original Single View Application. Then we'll make one of our own.

Open up:
 /Developer/Platforms/iPhoneOS.platform/Developer/Library/Xcode/Templates/Project Templates/iOS/Applications

and choose Single View Application.xctemplate.

As you can see, we have a storyboard, an image and a .plist file.

Open the TemplateInfo.plist file with Xcode, which will display it as a table with keys and values, or with any text editor which will display the file content using XML.

Maybe the most important thing here is the Identifier key, whose value is com.apple.dt.unit.singleViewApplication.

Every template has an identifier key which consists of a prefix and the name of the template. Apple uses a com.apple.dt.unit prefix, so every template provided by them has it. For our custom template we have to provide our own identifier prefix.

There is also an Ancestors key, and if you are thinking ​this refers to inheritance, you are absolutely right. The whole deal is that the Xcode templates are organized in a sort of a tree structure, and the Ancestors key defines the parents of the current template. In fact, this is the purpose of the identifier—it allows for referring to the template in order to make possible the creation of hierarchies when there are shared properties between different templates. For example, if you follow the ancestors of the Single View Application template, you will have the following hierarchy:

Each template inherits the properties defined in its ancestors and adds specific ones on top of them. So, the easiest way to create a template is to plug it in the scheme above as last child. The basic scheme of our template will look exactly the same except for the com.apple.dt.unit.SingleViewApplication node, which will be replaced by our template.

Of course, if for some reason you have to build more templates and they share some definitions, you may want to extend the provided by Apple hierarchy in order to reduce the identical definitions in different files.

Ok, next we'll go to ~/Library/Developer/Xcode/Templates.

If the Templates directory does not exist, create it.

Then, in the Templates directory, create another folder, called Custom. It will represent the group to which our template belongs. This folder will show up in Xcode on the right side of the new project panel along with the default categories—Application and Framework & Library.

Alright, now I am going to ask you to break some programming rules. ​If you're okay with it, let’s do some copy/pasting.

Go to the default iOS project templates and copy the Single View Application.xctemplate.

Go back to the ~/Library/Developer/Xcode/Templates/Custom directory and paste it there.

That's it—no more copy/paste, I promise!

Now we have to open the .plist file of our template and change the identifier prefix with, let’s say, com.tkexample.dt.unit.

Let’s test what we have just done. Open Xcode and in the new project panel you should be able to see your custom category with the project template in it.

Piece of cake, right?

Now let’s see how we can modify our template. The answer lays in the rest of the .plist file.

Customizations & Setup

In my experience the most common modifications in a Project Template could be code modifications, build settings and build phases setup.

Let’s start from the build settings and what we can do here.

All the modifications over the build settings should be contained under the key SharedSettings. All build settings are described in the Apple documentation— you can find a link to the article here, and it's quite useful. If you go through the stock .plist files, you will see different definitions in the SharedSettings dictionary. Here you can include all of the build settings from the Apple article depending on your needs, including FRAMEWORK_SEARCH_PATHS.

In the implementation of the Single View Application there are definitions of the ViewController class using notation with code implementations.

We are going to use another notation which does not require actual code definitions. Instead of defining every class with its content in the Nodes array, we have to just declare that such files exist. Then in the Definitions dictionary we have to set the path to the files.

Let’s add another class called TestClass into our template.

Add the following lines at the bottom of the Nodes array in the Objective-C section:

respectively add in the Swift section.

Now we have to specify where our class files are located. Add the following lines in the Definitions dictionary.

We can also organize our files into groups. Let’s put our new class into a group called CustomClasses. Modify the Definitions dictionary as show below,
and keep in mind that adding more than one value in the Group array leads to nesting of groups.

Basically, this how you create custom project templates in Xcode 7.

Keep in mind that the best way to gain knowledge of something new is to play around with it. Speaking of which, here is link to the GitHub repo with the template we just created. Plug it into XCode and check out the result.

We're always adding new improvements to UI for iOS, and this and many other​s will be a part of the next UI for iOS release coming ​in the beginning of November. Feel free to get a Trial of the current official version from here.

May the force be with you, ninjas!

The Process of Defining a Roadmap

As much as shaping a roadmap may seem quite a trivial task at first sight, it is actually the final outcome of thorough internal discussions between our Engineering, Product Management and Product Strategy leads. It also requires the identification and prioritization of key customer stories ​for which we would like to provide solutions in the next development cycle. The important factors taken into account during this process are as follows:

• Industry research and analysis
• Direct customer surveys and feedback (including our UserVoice portal) 
• Forum posts and support requests
• Input from Telerik leadership

As visible from the bullets above, your feedback strongly influences the decision making process. It​'s a big part of what guides ​our development plans for providing web and mobile solutions with Kendo UI ​for you​ as a developer. When this data is carefully analyzed, correlated and mapped to key deliverables, the roadmap clicks in and is published on our site.

Given this insight, here are the main deliverables which we plan to pack into our Q1 2016 installment. 

Spreadsheet Goes Official

More Kendo UI App Templates and Visual Studio Project Templates

Angular 2.0 and Web Components Integrations

Northwind Dashboard App - AngularJS version

(with downloadable source code) right in our online demos.



I'll also give you a hint​—you can even review the sample app implementation ​right now. It's freely accessible in our github repository here.
​

Grid Features

Extended Widget ​Functionality

• Option to disable calendar/date pickers dates (#2 voted item on our UV portal)
• Support for a child member being a root with multiple axis dimensions for the PivotGrid

Documentation Improvements

ASP.NET MVC Server Wrappers

ASP.NET vNext Support

New Visual Studio Dashboard Project Template

Beyond Q1 2016

Your Thoughts?

Knowing what's coming in the first major release of Kendo UI in 2016 and onward, I can't wait to hear what you think about our plans. Be the first to share ​your opinion in the comments. Also ​keep in mind that we operate in a dynamic environment, and our preliminary plans might undergo some changes going forward.

If you don’t know the word “cohort,” this is what the dictionary says:

cohort

noun

1. An ancient Roman military unit, comprising six centuries, equal to one tenth of a legion
2. A group of people with a shared characteristic

Even though it could have been interesting to start mimicking military organizational elements from the Roman empire, the User Retention Cohorts that we recently introduced in Telerik Analytics are more related to definition (2) above. Although the report type does have the power of a small military unit…

Before We Dive In...

It can all sound a bit complicated, and to some extent it is, but if we keep track of the intention with user retention cohorts, then it gets easier to grasp. Basically we wish to present data that will help you understand how loyal your users are. What type are they? Do they use your app once and never again? Do they use it multiple times every day and seemingly without any end? Where are they on this scale?

What is a Telerik Analytics User Cohort?

When we speak about users in Telerik Analytics we actually mean unique installations of a given software application running on a set of devices. This could, for example, be a given hybrid app running on a number of different mobile phones. Each running app instance would be what we call a user.

A user cohort is a subset of all users that you are monitoring with Telerik Analytics for your application. In other words if we look at all the users of one of your apps, then a user cohort is simply a subset of these users.

In this first release of User Retention Cohorts the shared characteristic for the cohorts is simply the time the application is started the first time. You could say, when the “user is born.” We have chosen to implement three different cohort types: day, week and month. These correspond to the timespans that will determine whether a given user is in one cohort or the other. We basically group users by the day they were born, or the week or the month. A cohort could be all users born on Aug 12th 2015, or all users born in January 2012.

Let’s look at an example. Below we have a number of users listed with the time of the first execution of a given app.