Grid View Toolbars

• Feb 21, 2023
• 6 minutes to read

The DevExpress ASPxGridView control enables you to group the most important or frequently used grid commands and display them in customizable toolbars for efficient user access.

See Online Demo: Toolbar

Note

The ASPxGridBase.KeyFieldName property should be specified when using the following grid features:

• Edit data
• Add new and delete existing data item
• Select data item
• Master-detail view
• Endless paging

Toolbar Object

The ASPxGridView stores toolbars in its ASPxGridView.Toolbars collection. Each toolbar is a GridViewToolbar class instance. You can add toolbars to and remove them from the collection, and change the following characteristics of individual toolbars:

Toolbar Characteristic	Property	Description
Adaptive Behavior	GridToolbar.SettingsAdaptivity.Enabled	Specifies whether an adaptive behavior is enabled for the toolbar.
Availability	GridToolbar.Enabled	Gets or sets a value that indicates whether the toolbar is enabled, allowing the toolbar to respond to end-user interactions.
Item Alignment	GridToolbar.ItemAlign	Gets or sets the toolbar item alignment.
Name	GridToolbar.Name	Gets or sets the toolbar’s unique identifier name.
Position	GridToolbar.Position	Gets or sets the toolbar position.
Visibility	GridToolbar.Visible	Gets or sets a value specifying the visibility of the toolbar.

To populate a toolbar with toolbar items and to have indexed access to them, use the toolbar’s GridViewToolbar.Items property.

Toolbar Item Object

Toolbar items are instances of the GridViewToolbarItem class. This class is a descendant of the MenuItem class, so it inherits the functionality that makes a toolbar item appear and behave as a menu item.

Toolbar Item Characteristic	Property	Description
Group Separation	MenuItem.BeginGroup	Gets or sets a value that specifies whether the current menu item starts a group.
Group Name	MenuItem.GroupName	Gets or sets the name of a logical check group to which the menu item belongs.
Image	MenuItem.Image	Gets the settings of an image displayed within the menu item.
Name	MenuItem.Name	Gets or sets the unique identifier name for the current menu item.
Template	MenuItem.Template	Gets or sets a template used to display the content of the current menu item.
Text	MenuItem.Text	Gets or sets the text content of the current menu item.
Tooltip	MenuItem.ToolTip	Gets or sets the current menu item’s tooltip text.

Additionally, you can use the following options explicitly implemented for toolbar items to properly customize their behavior and appearance.

Toolbar Item Characteristic	Property	Description
Display Mode	GridToolbarItem.DisplayMode	Gets or sets the display mode of the current toolbar item within the toolbar.
Command to Execute	GridViewToolbarItem.Command	Gets or sets the name of a command executed when users click a toolbar item.
Child Items	GridViewToolbarItem.Items	Gets a collection that contains the toolbar items of the current toolbar item. Enables you to create hierarchies of nested toolbar items of unlimited depth.

Depending on the GridViewToolbarItem.Command property setting, a toolbar item either triggers a standard grid command (data item editing, deletion, creation, etc.) or performs a custom action, if required. This action should be implemented programmatically.

Standard Toolbar Item

To make a toolbar item execute a standard command, set the item’s GridViewToolbarItem.Command property to the desired command name listed in the GridViewToolbarCommand enumeration. A standard toolbar item automatically displays the command-related text and image (optional). When users click a standard toolbar item, the grid executes the corresponding command.

Note

The GridToolbarItem.ClientEnabled and MenuItem.Enabled properties are not in effect for a standard toolbar item.

Example - How to create standard items

The code snippet below demonstrates how to create two standard toolbar items—for the New and Refresh commands—in the markup.

ASPX

<dx:ASPxGridView runat="server" ID="Grid" ...>
        ...
        <Toolbars>
            <dx:GridViewToolbar ItemAlign="Right">
                <Items>
                    <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Command="New" />
                    ...
                    <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Command="Refresh" BeginGroup="true" />
                    ...
                </Items>
            </dx:GridViewToolbar>
        </Toolbars>
    </dx:ASPxGridView>

Custom Toolbar Item

If a toolbar item must perform a custom action, create a new GridViewToolbarItem object and use one of the following implementation options.

• Use Toolbar-Related Grid API

  Perform the following steps to identify the toolbar item and handle its clicks:

  1. Set Command to Custom

     Set the toolbar item’s GridViewToolbarItem.Command property to the GridViewToolbarCommand.Custom value (the default property setting).

  2. Set Name

     Use the toolbar item’s MenuItem.Name property to specify a custom command name.

  3. Set Text or Image

     Specify item characteristics (such as text, image, or both) using the item’s MenuItem.Text and MenuItem.Image properties together with the GridToolbarItem.DisplayMode property.

  4. Handle Event(s)

     Handle the client-side ASPxClientGridBase.ToolbarItemClick event or server-side ASPxGridView.ToolbarItemClick event (or both) to identify the triggered custom command by its name and execute the required action.

     Note

     Set the ASPxClientProcessingModeEventArgs.processOnServer property to true to process a custom toolbar item click on the server side (ASPxGridView.ToolbarItemClick). Otherwise, the custom toolbar item click is processed on the client side with the ASPxClientGridBase.ToolbarItemClick event handler.

• Use a Template to Define Item

  Create the toolbar item’s template with the MenuItem.Template property to define the item content and specify custom logic to implement the item behavior.

In Preview Changes mode, the grid displays the following default command items that allow you to edit data:

• New
• Edit
• Delete
• DeleteSelectedRowsOnPage
• Refresh
• Update
• Cancel

To display a custom toolbar item in this mode, set the item’s VisibleInBatchEditPreviewChanges property to true.

ASPX

<dx:ASPxGridView runat="server" ID="Grid" ...>
    <Toolbars>
        <dx:GridViewToolbarItem 
            Text="Edit Commands" 
            Command="Custom"
            VisibleInBatchEditPreviewChanges="true" >
            <Items>
                <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Command="New" />
                <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Command="Edit" />
                <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Command="Delete" />
            </Items>
        </dx:GridViewToolbarItem>
    </Toolbars>        
    ...
</dx:ASPxGridView>

Result:

Example - How to create custom items (by specifying their names, text and images)

The code below creates a custom ‘Export to’ toolbar item with three sub-items to export the grid data to different formats (PDF, XLSX, and XLS).

ASPX

<dx:ASPxGridView runat="server" ID="Grid" OnToolbarItemClick="Grid_ToolbarItemClick" ...>
        <Toolbars>
            <dx:GridViewToolbar ItemAlign="Right">
                <Items>
                    ...
                    <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Text="Export to" Image-IconID="actions_download_16x16office2013" BeginGroup="true">
                        <Items>
                            <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Name="CustomExportToPDF" Text="PDF" Image-IconID="export_exporttopdf_16x16office2013" />
                            <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Name="CustomExportToXLS" Text="XLS(DataAware)" Image-IconID="export_exporttoxls_16x16office2013" />
                            <dx:GridViewToolbarItem Name="CustomExportToXLSX" Text="XLSX(WYSIWYG)" Image-IconID="export_exporttoxlsx_16x16office2013" />
                        </Items>
                    </dx:GridViewToolbarItem>
                    ...
                </Items>
            </dx:GridViewToolbar>
        </Toolbars>        
        ...
        <ClientSideEvents ToolbarItemClick="OnToolbarItemClick" />
    </dx:ASPxGridView>

JS

function OnToolbarItemClick(s,e) {
            if(IsExportToolbarCommand(e.item.name)){
                e.processOnServer=true;
                e.usePostBack=true;
            }
        }
        function IsExportToolbarCommand(command){
            return command == "CustomExportToPDF" || command == "CustomExportToXLSX" || command == "CustomExportToXLS" ;
        }

C#

protected void Grid_ToolbarItemClick(object source, ASPxGridToolbarItemClickEventArgs e) {
        switch(e.Item.Name) {
            case "CustomExportToPDF":
                Grid.ExportPdfToResponse();
                break;
            case "CustomExportToXLS":
                Grid.ExportXlsToResponse(new XlsExportOptionsEx { ExportType = ExportType.DataAware });
                break;
            case "CustomExportToXLSX":
                Grid.ExportXlsxToResponse(new XlsxExportOptionsEx { ExportType = ExportType.WYSIWYG });
                break;
            default:
                break;
        }
    }

Example - How to create a custom item (by defining its template)

The following code creates a custom toolbar item with the Template property to imitate the functionality of the grid search panel’s editor:

ASPX

<dx:ASPxGridView runat="server" ID="Grid" ...>
        <Toolbars>
            <dx:GridViewToolbar ItemAlign="Right">
                <Items>
                    ...
                    <dx:GridViewToolbarItem BeginGroup="true">
                        <Template>
                            <dx:ASPxButtonEdit ID="tbToolbarSearch" runat="server" NullText="Search..." Height="100%">
                                <Buttons>
                                    <dx:SpinButtonExtended Image-IconID="find_find_16x16gray" />
                                </Buttons>
                            </dx:ASPxButtonEdit>
                        </Template>
                    </dx:GridViewToolbarItem>
                </Items>
            </dx:GridViewToolbar>
        </Toolbars>        
        ...
        <SettingsSearchPanel CustomEditorID="tbToolbarSearch" />
        ...
    </dx:ASPxGridView>