Version 3.0

Please read these notes before upgrading to SandDock version 3.0 from a previous version.

Potential Breaking Changes

Due to some significant enhancements to the SandDock library in this version there are a few potential breaking changes you should be aware of.

• We have upgraded the way layout works internally, which leads to much better accuracy and consistency of window sizes through various operations. If your application was creating and using layout systems programmatically, it will be affected in the change of datatype of the LayoutSystemBase.WorkingSize property from Size to SizeF. Most applications will be unaffected because this is an advanced property that it isn't usually necessary to use at all.

Product Activation

This release contains product activation, which prompts for your Divelement account details during installation. You must open at least one form in design mode for Visual Studio to detect our licensing and create (or update) the licenses.licx file in your project ready for compilation.

Designer Code

When initially opening and compiling a SandDock application you may receive compiler warnings about obsolete code. That's because the windows forms designer code generated by the previous version references members that are now obsolete. These are warnings, not errors, and all you need to do is open the form designer, change a property, then re-save to force the designer to re-generate the code. The new code will not reference obsolete members.

Major Enhancements

• An Office 2007 renderer is included that makes an excellent companion to SandBar or SandRibbon when they are used with an Office 2007 look.
• Window "memory" is greatly improved so when transitioning between docked, tabbed and floating states a window is able to open itself at a more accurate last location. The format of the layout serialization XML has changed but is fully backwards-compatible.
• We have introduced an AutoSaveLayout property (.NET 2.0+ only) which uses the windows forms settings store to save layout information. If you turn this on, you don't even need to call GetLayout and SetLayout to store your layout.
• The Collapsed property on dockable windows can be set at design time. Like the Visible and Enabled properties, it does not actually take effect at design time, only at runtime. This has always been a popular request, and saves developers the trouble of collapsing windows in code in the form's Load event, as was previously recommended.