Providing Images
- 4 minutes to read
This topic describes how to provide images for the Image and Bound Image dashboard items.
Supported Formats
The Image and Bound Image items support only raster images. Vector images are not supported because there is no capability to specify an actual image size.
Providing Static Images
To load an image into the Image dashboard item, use the Ribbon’s Load Image and Import Image buttons in the Open group on the Design tab of the Image Tools contextual tab set. You can also use the corresponding menu buttons in the toolbar (the 
or 
buttons, respectively) or commands in the context menu (Load Image… and Import Image…, respectively).
These commands invoke the Open dialog, which allow you to locate the desired image.
The Load Image command saves the path to the image in the dashboard definition, while the Import Image command saves the image itself.
To load an image in code, assign the image URL to the ImageDashboardItem.Url property, or provide the image as a byte array using the ImageDashboardItem.Data property.
Binding the Bound Image to Data
The Bound Image dashboard item provides the Attribute data section containing the corresponding placeholder.
You need to specify the binding mode for the Bound Image by clicking the Options button (the 
icon) next to the Attribute placeholder. This invokes the following dialog.
This dialog provides two options.
- Binary Array - Use this mode if images are stored in the data source as byte arrays.
URI - Use this mode to locate images accessible by a predefined URI. In this case, the data source field should return strings that are parts of URIs to these images. For instance, the URI pattern in the form below specifies the path to the folder containing the required images.
C:\Users\Public\Documents\DevExpress Demos 23.2\Components\Data\ProductDetailsImages{0}.jpg
Data source field values will be inserted to the position of the {0} placeholder. Thus, the Bound Image maps the current dimension value with the image placed at the specified URI.
To bind the Bound Image to data in code, do the following steps.
- Specify the binding mode using the BoundImageDashboardItem.DataBindingMode property.
- Specify the dimension providing images or parts of URIs to access images using the BoundImageDashboardItem.ImageDimension property.
- If you selected the URI binding mode, specify the URI pattern used to access images using the BoundImageDashboardItem.UriPattern property.
Note
Note that the Bound Image can display only a single image simultaneously. If Master Filtering is not applied to the Bound Image, it selects the displayed image in the following ways.
- In the Binary Array mode, the displayed image cannot be predicted precisely as a result of sorting limitations for the image/binary data types. Use the Master Filtering feature to display the specified image.
- In the URI mode, the Bound Image displays an image corresponding a first attribute value taking into account the attribute’s sort order.
Example
The following code snippet shows how to use a Bound Image dashboard item to display a specified image accessible by a predefined URI.
using System.Windows.Forms;
using DevExpress.DashboardCommon;
using DevExpress.DataAccess.ConnectionParameters;
using DevExpress.DataAccess.Sql;
using DevExpress.XtraEditors;
namespace Dashboard_BoundImage {
public partial class Form1 : XtraForm {
public Form1() {
InitializeComponent();
Dashboard dashboard = new Dashboard();
XmlFileConnectionParameters xmlParams = new XmlFileConnectionParameters();
xmlParams.FileName = @"..\..\Data\DashboardProductDetails.xml";
DashboardSqlDataSource xmlDataSource = new DashboardSqlDataSource("Data Source 1", xmlParams);
SelectQuery selectQuery = SelectQueryFluentBuilder
.AddTable("Products")
.SelectColumns("Id", "Name", "Description")
.Build("Query 1");
xmlDataSource.Queries.Add(selectQuery);
xmlDataSource.Fill();
dashboard.DataSources.Add(xmlDataSource);
BoundImageDashboardItem boundImage = new BoundImageDashboardItem();
boundImage.DataSource = xmlDataSource; boundImage.DataMember = "Query 1";
boundImage.DataBindingMode = ImageDataBindingMode.Uri;
boundImage.ImageDimension = new Dimension("Name");
boundImage.UriPattern = @"..\..\ProductDetailsImages\{0}.jpg";
boundImage.SizeMode = ImageSizeMode.Stretch;
ListBoxDashboardItem comboBox = new ListBoxDashboardItem();
comboBox.ShowCaption = false;
comboBox.DataSource = xmlDataSource; comboBox.DataMember = "Query 1";
comboBox.FilterDimensions.Add(new Dimension("Name"));
comboBox.ListBoxType = ListBoxDashboardItemType.Radio;
comboBox.ShowAllValue = false;
dashboard.Items.AddRange(comboBox, boundImage);
dashboardViewer1.Dashboard = dashboard;
}
}
}