All RadarCube versions (WinForms, ASP.NET & VCL) share the same principle of saving its data that allows both saving and later restoring of:
- The Grid or the Chart state (pivot-panels, drilling, sorting, filtering, grouping and so on)
- Current visual settings of the Grid or the Chart (in WinForms-versions only)
- Full Cube data (for Direct and Desktop versions only). This option allows operating the Cube offline, without establishing connection to the database.
The cross-platform compatibility of the saved data is also worth mentioning: for all versions the Grid state is saved in XML format. That means, you can save the Grid state in the WinForms application, and then read it in ASP.NET or VCL versions of RadarCube.
Also WinForms and ASP.NET versions have the same format of the Cube data. For instance, you can start working in the “cloud”, retrieve all the data you need from the server and then continue analyzing them offline in the WinForms-application.
Programmatically the save/restore operations are performed by the following method pairs:
- TOLAPGrid(or Chart).Save (or SaveCompressed) /Load. This method allows saving any combination of data mentioned above in binary format.
- TOLAPCube.Save (or SaveCompressed) /Load. This method allows saving the Cube data only in binary format.
- TOLAPGrid(or Chart).Serializer.WriteXML /ReadXML. This method allows saving the Grid state and (if specified) its visual settings in XML format. The TOLAPGrid(or Chart).Serializer.XMLString property, that presents the Grid state as a string for storing in the database, for example, may also prove useful.
Of all these methods the first one is the most common: it calls the second and the third ones, if necessary, and includes their returned data in the resulting file. But its the third method that uses the cross-platform XML format that can be read by all RadarCube versions.