The All-New RadDesktopAlert for WinForms

An important part of the new stuff that is coming with Q2 2010 is the brand new RadDesktopAlert component. As a part of the WinForms suite, it fully supports the Telerik Presentation Framework which means it can be flexibly styled in the Visual Style Builder, as well as flawlessly integrated in any type of Windows Forms based applications. This component comes with a bunch of predefined themes, in fact all that we ship out of the box, and with a convenient API that allows for different modifications according to the requirements of a specific application context.

One of the key features that make the RadDesktopAlert stand out from the crowd is the multi-monitor support. Thanks to the DesktopAlertManager, you can choose an active monitor and all alerts will be displayed on it:

DesktopAlertManager.Instance.SetActiveScreen(Screen.AllScreens[1]);

Again thanks to the DesktopAlertManager, you can display multiple alerts on the screen without manually adjusting their position – they will be automatically stacked vertically so that the screen real estate is used optimally:

A typical RadDesktopAlert has a caption grip which can be used to move it on the screen, system buttons that can be used to close the alert, pin it on the screen or display a drop-down menu with custom options. Below the caption is the content area where an image and text can be displayed. You can use HTML formatting to change the style of different parts of the text just the same way as you do with the rest of the Telerik WinForms components. At the bottom part of the alert you can display a strip of custom buttons that can be bound to specific actions. Other important features are the support for fade-in and fade-out animations, and also popup animations with different easing types.

You will be able to find the RadDesktopAlert component in the Q2 2010 Beta release and take a look at what it has to offer. We have also updated our online help so that you will be able to explore the functionality of the control. Any feedback you might have that will help us improve this new control is highly appreciated!