New Features

TX Text Control 12.0 provides the several new features all described in the following tables.

Anchored Images

In prior versions of TX Text Control images could either be inserted as a single character or geometrically positioned relative to the complete document. Now a third method is supported that is called 'anchored to a paragraph'. This means that the text still flows around the image but the geometrical position is relative to the paragraph to which it is anchored. If other text is inserted in front of this paragraph the image is moved with the text. Additional implementations of the ImageCollection.Add method have been implemented to insert such an image in the text. All properties of the Image class have been enhanced so that the programmer can manipulate anchored images like all other images.

Text Frames

TX Text Control now supports text frames. A text frame is a rectangle that can be filled with text by an end-user and that can be edited like the main text. A text frame can be positioned like an image, either geometrically or as a single character. Geometrically its position can either be relative to a paragraph to which it is anchored or relative to a document's page. Text frames can be inserted, deleted and manipulated through the TextFrameCollection class that can be obtained through the TextControl.TextFrames Property. The TextFrameCollection class work in the same way as the ImageCollection class. A text frame is fully programable from program code. The TextFrame class provides properties and methods that enable a programmer to manipulate a text frame's text in the same way as the document's main text. Further properties set text frame attributes, such as the width of the border line, internal margins and the background color.

Image and Text Frame Attributes

Two new built-in dialog boxes have been added to allow attributes of images and text frames to be changed. It can be used to set general attributes, such as size, text wrapping, scaling and text distances. Furthermore, special attributes of images like filename, format, resolution and compression for image export, and special attributes of text frames like background color and frame attributes can be set. The new TextControl.ImageAttributesDialog and TextControl.TextFrameAttributesDialog methods open these dialogs.

Server Programming

TX Text Control provides the new ServerTextControl class to support programable text features for use in a server-based ASP.NET application. This class has the same programming interface than the TextControl class without the visual interface. A large amount of example programs are available and are described in the ASP.NET User's Guide.

Image and Text Frame Mouse Interface

A new mouse interface for images and text frames is available. They can be moved and sized in every insertion mode. A selection frame with size handles shows the current selection state.

Table Formatting

Additional features have been added to give end-users more control of how tables are formatted at page breaks. A forced page break can be inserted in a table at each character position using the CTRL+ENTER key combination. This moves the complete table row to the next page. Additionally, a table row can receive a new formatting attribute determining that the complete row is moved to the next page, if at least one line of text is on the next page. Furthermore, a height can be specified which is the table row's minimum height. If more text is inserted, the height grows as necessary. All of these features can be set with the built-in dialog box for setting table attributes and through code using the TableRow.MinimumHeight and TableRow.AllowPageBreak properties.