© 2016 xPortTools Inc. All rights reserved.
Welcome to the release of .NET xPorter for Microsoft® Excel. This readme file contains important information about this release of .NET xPorter for Microsoft® Excel.
.NET Framework 3.0 or newer
IMPORTANT: To install component under Windows Vista or Windows 7 you need to select Setup.exe file, right click on it and select "Run as Administrator" option in popup menu.
For the installation of the .NET xPorter for Microsoft® Excel you are required to install .NET Framework 3.0 or newer version of the .NET Framework. .NET xPorter for Microsoft® Excel requires installation of the license even for the demo mode. To install .NET xPorter for Microsoft® Excel run Setup.exe and follow installation wizard prompts. If you have a license key, then please check if you have an active Internet connection, which is required to activate your product, and input provided installation key. After activation is completed, the license file will be deployed into the registry of your PC and into installation folder of the .NET xPorter for Microsoft® Excel. License deployed into the registry is a global and visible for any application, which uses .NET xPorter for Microsoft® Excel.
In some cases, if your computer is behind a firewall and requires proxy authentication, you could get a message that valid Internet connection does not exist during registration. To resolve specified issue you need to specify proxy settings and/or optional credentials to be able to register component. See more details about in "What's new in Build 2.2" section.
- Bug fix: XLSX file gets corrupted when more than ten different background colors applied to a spreadsheet.
- Added formulas support for XLSX file format.
- Added functionality to cast Object-type values from DataTable/DataView into specific cell data type during export.
- Added Indent property to the Style class to support horizontal indentation of cell values.
- Bug fix. If source data inside of DataTable contains any strings with ASCII codes 1-8 or 11-31, export into XLSX file format gets corrupted.
- Bug fix: Export into HTML not formatted properly if DataTable contains Null values.
- Bug fix: Column width items not always applied during export to XLSX file format.
- Bug fix: Export into XLSX file format generates OutOfMemoryException. Fix requires .NET Framework 3.0 or newer version of the .NET Framework.
- Bug fix: Some of values are formatted as dates even though values are not dates.
- Bug fix: Significantly improved performance of export to XLS and XSLX file formats when styles applied to the export.
- Bug fix: When style format strings contains Unicode character, component generates incorrect output for XLS file format.
- Bug fix: "The invoked member is not supported in a dynamic assembly." exception is thrown when component is hosted under ASP.NET 4.0.
- Added functionality to rotate text inside of Excel cells.
- Improved performance for HTML export from DataView.
- Bug fix. Columns width inside of exported spreadsheets could be set to zero if regional settings are not English US.
- Added functionality to export data into HTML tables without nesting result into HTML and BODY tags (HTMLTable export option).
- Improved performance for HTML export.
- Bug fix. Some numeric and date values are not properly exported when regional settings are not English.
- Bug fix. If export into XLSX file format contains multiple spreadsheets, all of them are selected as an active instead of only the first one.
- Bug fix. Component throws OutOfMemory exception when hosted under Azure environment.
- Bug fix. If source data inside of DataTable contains any strings with ASCII code 0, export into XLSX file format gets corrupted.
- Added functionality to export data from multiple DataTables and selected columns in one pass.
- Component re-branded to .NET xPorter for Microsoft® Excel.
- Release introduces new functionality to support styles for export to Microsoft Excel 2007 XLSX file format.
- Bug fix. During export to XLS file format some of date values were displayed in dd/mm/yyyy hh:mm:ss format regardless of regional settings on PC where file was opened. Fix corrects specified issue and date values now displayed based on regional settings of computer where Excel file is opened
- Bug fix. Component could generate corrupted file during export into XSLX file format. File gets corrupted when export accomplished on computer where regional settings differ from default United States settings.
- Bug fix. When values inside of the DataTable are NULLs and styles applied to the data during export into the native (XLS) Excel file format, then in some cases cells inside of the spreadsheet that should be blank may contain value of the cell with the index A1 in a spreadsheet.
- Release 3.0 introduces new functionality to export data into Microsoft Excel 2007
XLSX file format. Release supports export of the data into new format, but formatting
of the data (styles) in current release supported only during export into Excel8
(binary BIFF8) format. Formatting of the data during export into Excel 2007 format
will be supported in upcoming releases.
- Release supported only for the .NET Framework 2.0 and new functionality will
not be released for .NET Framework 1.0 or 1.1.
- Bug fix. When data exported into binary Excel format and formatted using styles, component could generate "Specified cast is not valid" exception. Exception thrown when style with the same formatting string created multiple times for different regions of the formatted data.
Release 2.8 of the component introduces various formatting styles that could be
applied to the exported data during export into the binary Excel format:
- Possibility to apply styles what allow to define fonts, colors, alignment and
borders of the cells;
- Possibility to set width of the columns inside of the binary Excel spreadsheet;
- Possibility to set height of the rows inside of the binary Excel spreadsheet;
- Bug fix. When data exported into binary Excel format and data contains GUID-type column, component could generate "Conversion from type 'Guid' to type 'String' is not valid" exception. Issue affects only export of the GUID data into binary Excel format and does not affect export into other supported formats.
- Bug fix. When data exported into binary format and workbook contains multiple spreadsheets, then all spreadsheets selected as one group. It may affect printing of the data. No loss or corruption of the data occurs. For more details about grouping of the spreadsheets and what could be affected, please visit http://support.microsoft.com/kb/125640
IMPORTANT: Starting from Build 2.6.3 component implements new licensing model.
- Starting Build 2.6.3, xPort Tools for .NET introduces set of changes how licensing model works on developer's PC. Please read "Installation, Distributing and Licensing for xPort Tools for .NET" of the component's documentation for more details. To check if you have Build 2.6.3 of the component please follow following steps: Right click on VM.xPort.DS2XL.dll file in installation folder of the component and select Properties menu option. Click on the Version tab and select Product Version item inside of the "Item Name:" box. "Value:" box right to the "Item Name:" box will display build number of the component.
- Starting Build 2.6.3 component is NOT automatically installed into the Global Assembly Cache (GAC) during installation process. Please use Gacutil.exe utility from the .NET Framework in a case if you need to share component using GAC.
- Bug fix. Setting Encoding property to custom encoding always resets it to UTF-8.
- New Encoding property. Added support for different encoding types for CSV and HTML outputs.
- New CSVDelimiter property. Added support for the custom delimiter character in CSV export format.
- New internal format for the dates during export into the native Microsoft(R) Excel binary format. Previous versions of the component saved date values as strings. New version saves dates using internal binary format that, in most cases, allows to improve performance during export and reduce size of the output files.
- New samples for VB.NET and C# applications.
- Improved performance during export of the binary columns into the native binary Excel format.
- Component DLL files (VM.xPort.DS2XL.DLL and VM.xPort.Exception.dll) merged into one VM.xPort.DS2XL.DLL file. Current change does NOT affect hierarchy of the classes and does not require any changes in existing source code on developer's side.
- Bug fix in installation of the component: You could get "Unspecified error during installation. Please contact manufacturer of the product" exception during installation of the component. Bug randomly affects users for whom .NET CLR does not load user's profile during installation of the component even in a case if user has an administrative privileges.
- Created C# Windows sample application.
- Bug fix: Component could randomly generate "Object reference not set to an instance of an object" exception during instantiation. Exception thrown in a case if .NET Framework GC collects shared license from the memory. License of the component is shared among multiple instances of the components and if any instance of the component released from memory, in some cases, GC could collect shared license even if it is used by other instances of component. Fix issues individual licenses for each instance of the component.
- Bug fix: C# applications did not see events of the component. Events were available in VB.NET applications. Bug affects only C# applications that where using component events.
- Improved performance during export. In some cases developers could expect slight performance improvement during export of the data into all supported export formats.
- Created additional ASP.NET sample to preview exported Excel files in a browser.
- Added support to export binary content from the DataTable into the output result.
- Created new ASP.NET sample application.
- Created functionality to export DataSet into the CSV-formatted files. You could export complete DataSet into the CSV file in one pass. All or selected DataTables inside of the DataSet exported into the single CSV-formatted file in a sequential order.
- New version of the component allows to choose export mode during exporting of the source data into the native Microsoft Excel binary format. Check documentation for the complete details of the new mode.
- Changes in installation process of the component. If your PC located behind the firewall and requires proxy authentication, now you could optionally specify name or IP address of your proxy server and/or optional credentials to connect to the Internet during registration. During installation, component asks for the installation key and if your PC is behind the firewall that requires proxy authentication, check "I am behind a firewall and need to specify proxy settings to connect to the Internet" checkbox and installation screen will show all the required settings you need to specify for the proxy server (proxy server IP address/name and proxy port number). If your proxy server requires specific authentication credentials, then uncheck "Use default credentials" checkbox and specify required credentials in provided fields. By default, installation uses credentials of the current user.
- Bug fix: If exported string data contains ASCII characters in a range between 127 and 255 ASCII codes, then Microsoft Excel could display some of these characters as ? character. Even though characters are not Unicode, Microsoft Excel does not recognize them as a valid ASCII characters. Export component converts all the characters in a specified range into Unicode, forcing Microsoft Excel to recognize and display proper strings. Current bug does not affect exports where all the characters are English or Unicode.
- Bug fix: Output export files could be corrupted and cannot be opened in Excel. Specified issue cannot be predicted in 100% cases, but could happen in rare cases when there are several conditions exist during export of the data:
1. Application exports data into the native Excel format. No corruption of the data happens during export into other formats.
2. Export method specifies to include headers into the output file (includeHeaders parameter of the Export method is set to True). If application does not export headers, not corruption happens.
3. Total length of the unique strings inside of exported source more than 8208 bytes.
4. Size of the exported data.
To resolve specified issue you could export data into the binary Excel format without including headers, export into Excel XML format including headers or install version 2.1.4 of the component.
- Bug fix: component could generate "An instance of type 'VM.xPort.DS2XL' was being created, and a valid license could not be granted for the type 'VM.xPort.DS2XL'. Please contact the manufacturer of the component for more information." error message when component is referenced from the ASP.NET application and valid license exists on a running computer. Error could occur in a case if ASP.NET application is running in impersonation mode. Specified exception related to the issues in the .NET Framework and considered to be a bug in xPort Tools for .NET until further notice. To resolve specified issue you need to install version 2.1.3 of the component.
- Bug fix: component generates "An instance of type 'VM.xPort.DS2XL' was being created, and a valid license could not be granted for the type 'VM.xPort.DS2XL'. Please contact the manufacturer of the component for more information." error message when component is referenced from the ASP.NET application and valid license exists on a running computer. Error occurs in a case if the user profile is not loaded by the system under a scenario where the .NET code runs in a Web service, ASP page, or COM+. To resolve specified issue you need to install version 2.1.2 of the component.
- Bug fix: component generates "System.OverflowException: Value was either too large or too small for UInt16." error message. Exception could be thrown if next conditions apply:
1. DataSet contains multiple DataTables
2. DataSet exported into native Excel format.
3. Some of the DataTables inside of the DataSet are blank
4. Blank DataTables are located at the end inside of the DataSet.
5. Big size of the exported data (cannot be determined)
For example, if DataSet contains seven DataTables and fifth and seventh DataTables do not contain any rows, then component could generate specified exception. To resolve specified issue you could move blank DatTables to the beginning of the DataSet and then export DataSet into Excel. Version 2.1.2 addresses specified above issue and you could resolve it upgrading component to the version 2.1.2.
- Export of long (more than 65536 rows) DataTable and DataView datasources into the multiple spreadsheets using native Excel or XML Excel format on one step.
- Bug fix: some of the clients got "License already activated on another PC" message during installation. Specified issue has been fixed in a current installation for the version 2.1
- Export of all datasources into the memory stream.
- Export of the data into HTML format.
- Bug fix: application could throw invalid license exception when deployed into production ASP.NET environment.
- Support of the export ADO.NET DataViews into various formats.
- Export of the data into CSV, comma-delimited file format.