How to start?

The following screen shot, shows a general idea how parts and objects of the control are arranged:  

click to enlarge

The following steps shows you progressively how to start programming the Exontrol's ExGantt component:

• Load / Save Data. The control provides several ways to serialize your data, as listed:

• LoadXML / SaveXML methods, to load / save data using XML format.
• DataSource property, to load / update / save data from a table, query, dataset and so on.
• GetItems / PutItems methods, to load / save data from a/to safe array of data.

For instance, 

With Gantt1
	.LoadXML "https://www.exontrol.net/testing.xml"
End With

loads control's data from specified URL.

• Chart. The control's chart displays tasks based on the time-unit scale, using a multiple-levels header.

• UnitScale property, determines the base time-unit scale to be displayed on the chart.
• Label property, indicates the predefined format of the level's label for a specified unit, to be shown on the chart.
• LevelCount property, specifies the number of levels to be shown on the chart's header.

For instance, 

With Gantt1
	With .Chart
		.LevelCount = 2
		.UnitScale = exDay
	End With
End With

specifies that the chart's header should display two levels, and the base time-unit scale to be day.

• Bars. The chart's bars collection holds the types of the bars the chart can display. By default, it includes Task, Milestone, Summary, Project Summary, ...

• Add method, adds a new type of bar, including a combination of any of already predefined bars to display split or/and progress bars.
• Copy property, clones an already predefined bar.

For instance, 

With Gantt1
	.Chart.Bars.Add("Task%Progress").Shortcut = "TProgress"
End With

defines a new task bar to display a progress bar inside. See Item-Bars, to see how you can add tasks/bars to the control's chart panel.

• Links. See Item-Links, to see how you can add links between tasks/bars  to the control's chart panel.
• Columns. The control supports multiple columns, so always you can add / remove / move / hide any column

• Add method, adds a new column.
• ExpandColumns property specifies the columns to be shown/hidden when the column is expanded or collapsed.

For instance, 

With Gantt1
	With .Columns.Add("Check")
		.Position = 0
		.Def(exCellHasCheckBox) = True
	End With
End With

adds a new column that displays check-boxes, and that's the first visible column.

• Items. Any item can hold a collection of child items. Any item is divided in cells, once cell for each column in the control.

• AddItem method, adds a new item.
• InsertItem method, inserts a child item 
• InsertControlItem method, inserts a child item that hosts another control inside.

For instance, 

With Gantt1
	With .Items
		.AddItem "new item"
	End With
End With

adds a new item.

• Cells. An item contains a collection of cells, one cell for each column in the control. Any cell can be split or merge with one or more neighbor cells.

• CellCaption property, specifies the cell's caption.

For instance, 

With Gantt1
	With .Items
		h = .InsertItem(.FocusItem,"","item 1.1")
		.CellCaption(h,1) = "item 1.2"
		.CellCaption(h,2) = "item 1.3"
		.ExpandItem(.FocusItem) = True
	End With
End With

adds a new child item of the focused item, and fills the cell's caption for the second and third column.

• Item-Bars. Any item can display one or more tasks/bars.

• AddBar method, adds a new bar of specified type, giving its time interval.
• ItemBar property, updates properties of specified bar, like caption, effort, and so on

For instance, 

With Gantt1
	With .Items
		.AddBar .FocusItem,"Task",#4/1/2006#,#4/14/2006#,"new"
	End With
End With

adds a new task to the focus item, with the key "new".

• Item-Links. Any two-bars of the chart, can be linked.

• AddLink method, links two bars.
• Link property, gets access to the link's properties

For instance, 

With Gantt1
	With .Items
		.AddBar .FocusItem,"Task",#4/1/2006#,#4/14/2006#,"A"
		.AddBar .FocusItem,"Task",#4/18/2006#,#4/30/2006#,"B"
		.AddLink "AB",.FocusItem,"A",.FocusItem,"B"
	End With
End With

adds two linked bars A and B in the same item.

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