Explore the .NET MAUI Blazor App Template and What’s New for Blazor and Web in the 2021 Vol. 3 Release [Webinar Show Notes]

 This blog provides show notes for our October 28, 2021 webinar, “Explore the .NET MAUI Blazor App Template and What’s New for Blazor and Web in the 2021 Vol. 3 Release.” The webinar was presented by UmaMaheswari Chandrabose. If you missed the webinar or would like to watch it again, please see our YouTube channel or watch it here.

The Q&A segment of the webinar is provided at the end of this blog post.

Overview

During this webinar, we explored the .NET MAUI Blazor app template available in Visual Studio 2022 and saw how to add and work with Syncfusion Blazor components in it. We also saw the new features added in the 2021 Volume 3 release to our Blazor and Essential JS 2 components.

Agenda

• What’s new in Blazor for the 2021 Volume 3 release.
• What’s new in web for the 2021 Volume 3 release.
• Explore .NET MAUI Blazor apps and use Syncfusion Blazor components.

What’s new in Blazor for 2021 Volume 3

• .NET 6 Release Candidate 1 compatibility.
• Bootstrap 5 theming.
• New Breadcrumb component.
  • GUI to identify the user’s current position in a hierarchy of website links.
• New Icon component.
  • Easily render and customize icons in a web application.
• DataGrid features:
  • Adaptive UI layout for mobile devices.
  • Content template for column chooser.
  • Custom sort comparer.
• TreeGrid features:
  • Column chooser template.
  • Column virtualization.
  • Custom validation while editing records.
  • Paste and autofill.
• Charts features:
  • Performance improvements.
• Scheduler features:
  • Virtual scroll mask.
  • Header indent template.
  • Observable collection.
  • ExpandoObject and DynamicObject binding.
  • Custom sort comparer.
• Kanban features:
  • Observable collection.
  • ExpandoObject and DynamicObject binding.
  • Custom sort comparer.
• Pivot Table features:
  • Data labels in pivot chart.
• Gantt Chart features:
  • Header template.
  • Responsiveness.
• Maps features:
  • Online map providers.
  • Zooming toolbar customization.
• PDF Viewer features:
  • Performance improvements.
• PowerPoint Library features:
  • Encryption and decryption support.

What’s New in JS 2 for 2021 Volume 3

• Bootstrap 5 theming:
  • A new CSS theme added to all Essential JS 2 components.
• New Breadcrumb component:
  • GUI to identify the user’s current position in a hierarchy of website links.
• DataGrid features:
  • Sticky header.
  • Infinite scrolling with keyboard.
• TreeGrid features:
  • Freeze direction.
• Charts features:
  • Fixed column width.
• Scheduler features
  • Header indent template.
  • Custom sort comparer.
• PDF Viewer features:
  • Improved zooming performance.
  • Signature support.
• Data Manager features:
  • GraphQL support.
• Dropdown Tree features:
  • Custom template.
• Gantt Chart features:
  • Responsiveness.
• Query Builder UI features:
  • Complex data binding support with dropdown tree.
• Rich Text Editor features:
  • Enter key customization.
• Toast features:
  • Utility function.
• Spreadsheet features:
  • Autofill feature.
  • Password protection for worksheets.
  • Custom number formatting.
  • Formula values in data validation input.

Exploring .NET MAUI Blazor apps and creating a simple example

Prerequisites to work with .NET MAUI Blazor Apps

• .NET 6.
• Latest version of Visual Studio 2022 with the required workloads:
  • Mobile development with .NET.
  • Universal Windows Platform development.
  • ASP.NET and web development (required for .NET MAUI Blazor apps).

Summary

During this webinar, we checked out the .NET MAUI Blazor App template available in Visual Studio 2022 and the process of adding and working with Syncfusion Blazor components within it. We also discussed some of the updates we brought to our Blazor and Essential JS 2 components in the 2021 Volume 3 release. We hope you enjoyed this webinar, and hope you’ll keep an eye out for our future Blazor webinars.

Q&A

Can all the components be customized with CSS or code?

Yes, it is possible to customize all our Blazor components either using the built-in template code or via CSS styles. Also, you can use our Theme Studio tool to customize the default appearance of all our built-in themes.

For example, our Blazor DataGrid component can be customized in the following ways:

• Template
• Styling customization
• Theme Studio

Can you show how to open a Word document only in client-side Blazor WebAssembly, without the server-side?

You can check out this Blazor WebAssembly example which has been created to depict your requirements.

Do you also have Tailwind theming?

Yes, we do have support for Tailwind theming in all our Blazor components. You can have a look at this documentation to learn about the supported themes available in our Blazor components library.

Can you persist the columns chosen?

Yes, it is possible to persist the chosen columns. You can also persist the current grid state in the browser local storage for state maintenance by setting the EnablePersistence property to true. For more details, refer to this documentation.

Is there a better way to create PDF files directly from an RDLC file? Bold Reports seems to take up quite a bit of memory.

You can optimize memory utilization and increase the exporting speed by enabling virtual evaluation. Please refer to Improve the performance and handle large amounts of data with Report Viewer documentation.

So, is this considered server-side Blazor or client-side Blazor?

The .NET MAUI Blazor apps are all about running Blazor inside a .NET MAUI app (a cross-platform framework for creating native mobile and desktop apps). Here, the Blazor web view runs inside the MAUI project, so it won’t use WebAssembly or its own copy of .NET. Instead, the Blazor code runs in process with the MAUI app so that the Blazor code has access to everything that MAUI has access to, including platform APIs.

Recommended resources (related links):

• Getting started with Syncfusion Blazor components

Related blogs

• 4 Easy Steps to Embed a JavaScript Control into a Blazor App
• Easily Synchronize Blazor Resource Scheduler with RESTful Services
• Elegantly Visualize Data with the World’s Fastest Blazor Charts
• What’s New in 2021 Volume 3: Blazor