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Johan Nystrom
150
Wintree and Wingrid differences
posted

It seems to me that ultrawingrid and ultrawintree have a large overlap in terms of functionality - both can display multiple columns, both can display data hierarchically etc. So what are the rules of thumb for which one to use? I'm currently using a grid to display my data but considering to change to a tree, since the data has now become more obviously hierarchical in nature. 

Having some experience with the grid and little with the tree, I compared the two widgets briefly. It seems to me that

  • The tree is more lightweight (grid supports calculation manager and several seemingly heavyweight features)
  • The tree doesn't appear to support filtering (I could be wrong)
  • The tree has a free form display style, whereas in the grid it doesn't seem possible to give each item in a band its own set of columns

These differences seem quite subtle. Are there any other, more striking differences between these two controls, that I'm missing?

Many thanks,

Johan Nystrom 

  • 469350
    Verified Answer
    Offline posted

    Hi Johan,

        That's a pretty good summary. 

        The grid is really more suited to data entry or heavy manipulation of data. The grid has filtering, fixed columns and rows, summaries and supports CalcManager.

        A tree is typically more for navigation or for the user to select something (although the tree does support editing cells). The tree can also handle non-homogenous data sources, so rows within the same collection canbe completely different objects with different structures. The grid's data source has to be homogenous across all levels. 

        Also, the tree can be used completely unbound - it does not require a data source of any kind.

        You are right, the differences are subtle. This is mainly because the tree only recently gained the ability to be bound and display columns. It used to be much simpler.