Need way to force chart to build immediately

I am using the Mindscape Chart control in a report generator that can store canned reports and print (or preview) them without being displayed on the screen. As you know the Chart control plots the data series in the background. While this is a great feature it creates a problem in my scenario, since the series don't update before printing. I have found that if I add the following method to Chart.cs and call it before printing the charts render properly:

    public void BuildAllNow()
{
    if (_canvas != null)
    {
        foreach (DataSeries series in Series)
        {
            series.AnalyseSeries();
        }
        AutoSetAxisRange();
        _analyseSeriesQueued = false;
        BuildChart();
    }
}

However, rather than me modifying the source I was wondering if you could add a feature to force the chart to fully update. Either a similar method or a property setting would be fine.

Peter

Hi Peter,

Thanks for the suggestion. We'll look into the specifics of this and get back to you soon.

Callum

Hello Peter

The next nightly build will include a ForceRender method on the Chart control which you can use to help with printing.

Jason Fauchelle

Hi Jason,

I tried the ForceRender in the new version and find that it works very well. Thanks!

Peter

Hello,

I need to create a thumbnail list and I am trying to get some charts to be generated without being displayed. I am following the tips from here:

http://www.mindscapehq.com/forums/thread/442653 (without the OnApplyTemplate() call)

And also using the ForceRender method.

My problem is that the X-Axis values are not being displayed.

My code is:

  private void ForceRender(UIElement document)
  {
     Window _window;

     ScrollViewer panel = new ScrollViewer();
     panel.Content = document;
     panel.HorizontalScrollBarVisibility = ScrollBarVisibility.Visible;
     _window = new Window { Content = panel };
     _window.WindowStyle = WindowStyle.None;
     _window.AllowsTransparency = true;
     _window.Opacity = 0.001;
     _window.ShowInTaskbar = false;
     _window.ShowActivated = false;
     _window.Show();

     m_chart.ForceRender();

     ((ScrollViewer)_window.Content).Content = null;
     _window.Close();
     _window.Content = null;
  }

Obs: I need to set the contents null, since I am using the generated chart to avoid the "is already part of the logic tree" message. Also, as I am calling this method several times, I found out that, when I set the ShowActivated property to false, the main window does not lose focus.

I am uploading a print screen for you to see what I see.

Hello

I was unable to reproduce this issue. You could try moving Chart.ForceRender and closing the window to the Print method as seen in the other forum post you linked. The Print method is called through a dispatcher which can help solve these problems.

Are you using the same Chart instance displayed in the main window to create the print document? If my above suggestion does not work, you may need to use different Chart instances to generate the thumbnails. This would avoid the logical tree issues.

Otherwise, if you could send me a small repro project I'd be happy to debug it for you.

Jason Fauchelle

Hello Jason,

I have just sent you an e-mail to "jason@mindscape.co.nz" with the code to reproduce this issue.

Thanks