Solution
KB_Soft Group created an idea of a control which would be
fully adjusted in design time and provide control over its items and properties
with the help of property grid and a design form of VisualStudio. The control must
have no child windows to be fast and flexible in adjustment. Classes of .Net Framework
were used for this which allowed adjustment of the control's behaviour in design
time.
Then a class architecture was developed allowing adjustment
of any parameters without coding manually. One could simply add the control to a
form from VisualStudio toolbox and adjust its items by selecting them with mouse
(selecting an item shows all its properties in the property grid of the VisualStudio
environment).
The control's architecture is also flexible enough
to allow further enhancement (addition of new charts, indicators, rendering technologies,
etc.)
Adjustment of appearance and data binding of the component
was developed to provide the highest flexibility. Any aspects of the control's appearance
adjustment are available in the property grid of the VisualStudio environment.
To bind the control to data, KB_Soft Group developed its own
format of data binding string which allows a uniform specification for both binding
to databases and to files in the XML and CSV formats.
To provide a possibility of financial data analysis,
KB_Soft created a library of financial, statistical, and mathematical functions which
work with data arrays. The library includes the most popular financial indicators.
To provide convenience of charts scaling, KB_Soft developed
an intuitive user interface of scrolling and zooming. To scroll a chart, one can
either drag it or use scroll bars. User can zoom a chart either by spinning the
mouse wheel or by selecting and zooming an area on the chart.
Chart Areas and Annotation
Property page
Financial Indicators example
Scrolling and Zooming example
Software and Services:
VB.NET, C#, ADO.NET, XML, MS Visual Studio.NET 2005.
Results
As a result of the project, the client got a high-end
and scalable component for .Net windows applications which displays financial charts
and is fully integrated into VisulaStudio IDE. A comprehensive MSDN-style documentation,
a UserGuide in the CHM format, and a quick tutorial including flash movies for different
subjects and illustrating the use of the control were also developed in addition
to the component. The client was also provided with an extensive gallery of screenshots
for site design. Besides, demo projects were created to explain every capability
of the control.