Quinn-Curtis Launches Mobile Developers Charting Software for .Net Compact Framework

Low cost charting toolkit for Windows CE and Pocket PC developers

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Boston, Mass. – Quinn-Curtis, Inc. announces a new version of its charting software, targeted specifically at .Net Compact Framework developers. The QCChart2D CF  for .Net Compact Framework charting toolkit targets developers who want to display sophisticated interactive charting graphics on mobile computing devices running the Windows CE operating system. The toolkit includes support for linear, logarithmic, polar, and advanced time/date coordinate systems required by business, medical, engineering and scientific end users. Advanced user interface functions allow users to interact with applications: adding annotations, selecting, marking and moving data points, and zooming into a particular chart region. The software, written in managed code using C#, works with all platforms and browsers compatible with the .Net Compact Framework. The software has been tested and been proven compatible with versions of C# and Visual Basic supplied with Microsoft Visual Studio for .Net 2003 and 2005. A single user Developer License for the software costs $150. Developers are entitled to free updates for two years.

The .Net Compact Framework is a critically important component in the Microsoft's overall smart device and mobile computing strategy. According to Bill Gates,  “the .NET Framework and the .NET Compact Framework provide a consistent programming model across the full range of Windows platforms and expose that programming model through a single unified tool set, Visual Studio .NET 2003. Together, Visual Studio .NET 2003 and the .NET Compact Framework enable millions of desktop Visual Basic developers and the rapidly growing market of C# developers to begin building smart mobile applications."

The QCChart2D for .Net CF software consists of more than 100 classes. A brief summary of the major categories of classes appears below.

·        Plots - Line plots, area plots, bar plots, line marker plots, floating bars, scatter plots, group plots, open-high-low-close plots, error bar plots, pie charts, contour plots, candlestick plots, line gap plots, cell plots, histogram plots, arrow plots, bubble plots, polar plots, multi-line plots and stacked line plots. An unlimited number of plot objects can be combined in the same chart.

·        Datasets - Datasets hold the data plotted in the chart. Charts can plot an unlimited number of datasets, each dataset can contain an unlimited number of data points. Datasets can hold numeric and DateTime based data. Mark data points invalid, forcing a break in plotted lines.

·        Coordinate Systems - Linear, logarithmic, time/date and polar coordinate systems. An unlimited number of coordinate system, and axes, can be overlaid in the same plotting area of a graph.

·        Time/Date Coordinate Systems - The time/date scale is specified using DateTime objects. The time/date scales take into account the varying number of days in months and years. The scales can also take into account non-continuous time/date scales where a 5-day week is used, or where a full day consists of a specific time interval that can be something less than a 24-hour day. For example, it is possible to define a time/date scale where weekends are excluded and the day consists of the hours between 9:30 AM and 4:00 PM.

·        Axis - Linear, logarithmic, time/date and polar axis types. All axis types have manual and auto-scaling modes for setting axis ranges. Axis auto-scaling modes handle multiple datasets, group data and contour data. A chart can have an unlimited number of axes.

·        Axis Labels - Axes can have decimal, exponential, time, date, string and multi-line labels. Programmers can define custom numeric and time/date axis labels.

·        Chart Titles - Charts can have a main title, a subhead and a footer. Axes can have horizontal titles.

·        Axis Grids - Grid lines of any line style and color can highlight major and minor axis tick marks.

·        Import Images - Use .Net Image objects as plot elements in a chart, or as a background object.

·        Legends - Position horizontal and vertical legends anywhere in a chart. A chart can have an unlimited number of legends.

·        Mouse Interface - A group of classes implementing mouse event delegates can locate, select and move chart objects like data plots, axes, titles, and legends.

·        Simple and Super Zooming - Zoom a simple xy axis pair, or simultaneous zoom an unlimited number of x- and y-axes.

·        Data Cursors - XOR data cursors are used to position the mouse cursor over data points in a plot.

·        Data Markers - Drop special marker symbols on to the data presented in a graph, much like a bookmark in a word processing document.

·        Text and Annotations - Add an unlimited number single and multi-line text objects, arrows and geometric objects to a chart.

·        Data ToolTips - Select a data point with the mouse and popup a tooltip window that displays the data x- and/or y-values for the data points. Programmers can create custom information displays for tooltip windows.

·        Data Compression - Large datasets can be compressed, increasing display speed without loss of detail.

·        Documentation and Demo/Example Programs - The software includes a comprehensive 400-page user manual with many programming examples, XML help for every class and 75 complete example programs. Every programming example and example program is presented in C# and Visual Basic.

The QCChart2D for .Net CF software has a few limitations due to the constraints of mobile devices and general restrictions of the .Net Compact Framework API. Lines can only have a solid line style, i.e. no dot, dash or custom line styles, and are limited to a line width of one pixel. The .Net Compact Framework color model does not support alpha blending, so transparent colors are not possible. Text and bitmap images used in charts cannot be rotated.  In addition, charts cannot be printed from a mobile device, or saved to an image file.

 

For More Information Contact:

Quinn-Curtis, Inc.
Medfield, MA
Tel: 508-359-6639
FAX: 508-960-2729
Internet: info@quinn-curtis.com