ngx-devextreme-zoneless

Strongly-typed signal & zoneless change-detection adapters for DevExtreme Angular components.

DevExtreme widgets mutate their own state (user typing, row selection, popup closing, chart point clicks, …) through their internal option system. Under zoneless change detection nothing tells Angular about those mutations. This library bridges the gap with signals: every adapter writes widget changes into a signal (which schedules zoneless CD natively) and pushes signal changes back into the widget — with echo suppression, structural equality, optional debouncing and automatic teardown.

Angular signal  ──effect──▶  widget option / method
Angular signal  ◀──set────  widget event (optionChanged, selectionChanged, …)

• Angular ≥ 20 (built and verified against Angular 22, zoneless by default)
• DevExtreme / devextreme-angular ≥ 25.1 (built and verified against 26.1)
• TypeScript 6.0, strict, zero any in the public surface

Everything is derived from DevExtreme's own Properties declarations via template-literal and conditional types — option names, option value types and event payload types are string-literal unions that automatically follow the installed DevExtreme version. A typo'd option name is a compile error.

Installation

npm i ngx-devextreme-zoneless

Quick start

import { Component, signal } from '@angular/core';
import { DxTextBoxModule } from 'devextreme-angular/ui/text-box';
import { DxDataGridModule } from 'devextreme-angular/ui/data-grid';
import {
  DxTextBoxValueDirective,
  DxDataGridSelectedRowKeysDirective,
} from 'ngx-devextreme-zoneless';

@Component({
  imports: [DxTextBoxModule, DxDataGridModule,
            DxTextBoxValueDirective, DxDataGridSelectedRowKeysDirective],
  template: `
    <dx-text-box [(dxValue)]="search" [dxValueDebounce]="300" />
    <dx-data-grid [(dxSelectedRowKeys)]="selected" [dataSource]="orders" keyExpr="id">
      <dxo-selection mode="multiple" />
    </dx-data-grid>
  `,
})
export class OrdersComponent {
  readonly search = signal('');
  readonly selected = signal<readonly number[]>([]); // TKey inferred as number
  readonly orders = [{ id: 1 }, { id: 2 }];
}

Or import everything at once with DX_SIGNAL_DIRECTIVES (also available per family: DX_VALUE_DIRECTIVES, DX_NAVIGATION_DIRECTIVES, DX_VISIBLE_DIRECTIVES, DX_DATA_DIRECTIVES, DX_VISUALIZATION_DIRECTIVES).

Components without a dedicated directive (PivotGrid, Sortable, Menu, …) are covered too — see Composition API: the same engine works with any option and event of any DevExtreme component, fully typed.

Directive catalog

Editors — [(dxValue)]

Every value editor gets a [(dxValue)] two-way model plus dxValueDebounce (ms, widget → signal direction) and dxValueEqual (custom comparer) inputs.

Component	Model type
dx-text-box, dx-text-area, dx-html-editor	string
dx-number-box	number | null
dx-check-box	boolean | null
dx-switch	boolean
dx-date-box	Date | number | string | null
dx-date-range-box	readonly [start: DxDateValue | null, end: DxDateValue | null]
dx-calendar	DxDateValue | readonly DxDateValue[] | null
dx-color-box, dx-autocomplete	string | null
dx-slider	number
dx-range-slider	readonly [start: number, end: number]
dx-select-box, dx-lookup, dx-drop-down-box, dx-radio-group	generic TValue — inferred from your signal
dx-tag-box	generic readonly TKey[]
dx-filter-builder	DxFilterExpression | null
dx-range-selector	DevExtreme's declared scale range type

Where DevExtreme declares value?: any (SelectBox & friends) the directive is generic instead, so [(dxValue)]="status" with a signal<OrderStatus | null> is checked end-to-end.

Selection & data

Selector	Model
dx-data-grid[dxSelectedRowKeys], dx-tree-list[dxSelectedRowKeys]	readonly TKey[]
dx-list[dxSelectedItemKeys]	readonly TKey[]
dx-tree-view[dxSelectedNodeKeys]	readonly TKey[] (method-based: getSelectedNodeKeys / selectItem)
dx-gantt[dxSelectedRowKey]	TKey | null
dx-scheduler[dxCurrentDate]	Date | number | string
dx-scheduler[dxCurrentView]	DevExtreme's view union
dx-form[dxFormData]	generic TFormData — emits a fresh shallow copy per field edit

Navigation & overlays

Selector	Model
dx-tabs, dx-tab-panel, dx-accordion, dx-gallery + [dxSelectedIndex]	number
dx-drawer[dxOpened]	boolean
dx-popup, dx-popover, dx-tooltip, dx-toast, dx-load-panel, dx-action-sheet + [dxVisible]	boolean

[(dxVisible)] tracks every way an overlay can close (shading click, escape, close button, API) — the classic zoneless pain point.

Visualization

Selector	Model
dx-chart[dxSelectedPoints], dx-pie-chart[dxSelectedPoints]	readonly DxChartSelectedPoint[]

Chart selection is method-based; selected points are exposed as serializable { seriesName, argument, value } descriptors that can be stored and restored. DevExtreme charts do not select points on click by themselves (their demos wire onPointClick: e => e.target.select() manually), so these directives toggle the clicked point's selection by default — opt out with [dxPointClickToggle]="false" if you want to handle onPointClick yourself.

Composition API

The directives are sugar. The same engine is available as injection-context functions and covers every option and event of every DevExtreme component, fully typed:

import {
  bindDxOption, dxOptionSignal, dxEventSignal, injectDxInstance,
} from 'ngx-devextreme-zoneless';

@Component({ /* ... */ })
export class MyComponent {
  // On the same element (inside a directive):
  private readonly textBox = inject(DxTextBoxComponent, { self: true });

  // Two-way signal for any option — names & types from DevExtreme Properties:
  readonly placeholder = dxOptionSignal(this.textBox, 'placeholder');
  readonly mode = dxOptionSignal(this.textBox, 'mode', { initialValue: 'search' });

  // Latest payload of any widget event:
  readonly focusOut = dxEventSignal(this.textBox, 'focusOut');

  // Works with view children too (pass the viewChild signal itself):
  private readonly grid = viewChild(DxDataGridComponent<Order, number>);
  readonly filter = dxOptionSignal(this.grid, 'filterValue');

  // Bind an existing signal to an option:
  readonly keys = signal<number[] | undefined>([]);
  constructor() {
    bindDxOption(this.grid, 'selectedRowKeys', this.keys);
  }

  // The raw widget instance as a signal (undefined until created):
  readonly widget = injectDxInstance(DxTextBoxComponent);
}

Components without a dedicated directive

The coverage model is simple: a directive exists wherever a widget has genuine user-mutable two-way state (value, selection, visibility, index, current date/view, form data, chart points). Every other component — and any component DevExtreme ships in the future — is still fully supported through the composition API, because dxOptionSignal, dxEventSignal and bindDxOption are not written against a component list: their option names, option value types and event payloads are computed from the Properties declaration of whatever host component you hand them. Support doesn't cliff-edge at the directive catalog; it just gets one notch less sugary.

A few real-world cases:

// PivotGrid — no two-way options (its mutable state lives in the
// PivotGridDataSource), but every event and option is reachable, typed:
private readonly pivot = inject(DxPivotGridComponent, { self: true });
readonly cellClick = dxEventSignal(this.pivot, 'cellClick');
readonly contextMenu = dxEventSignal(this.pivot, 'contextMenuPreparing');

// Scheduler beyond [(dxCurrentDate)] / [(dxCurrentView)] — appointment
// lifecycle as signals:
private readonly scheduler = inject(DxSchedulerComponent, { self: true });
readonly appointmentAdded = dxEventSignal(this.scheduler, 'appointmentAdded');

// Sortable (e.g. a Kanban board built from dx-sortable + lists) — purely
// event-driven, so state stays in your signals and events drive mutations:
private readonly sortable = viewChild(DxSortableComponent);
readonly reorder = dxEventSignal(this.sortable, 'reorder');
constructor() {
  effect(() => {
    const e = this.reorder();
    if (e) this.cards.update((cards) => moveItem(cards, e.fromIndex, e.toIndex));
  });
}

// Any option of any widget, two-way — e.g. Menu, ButtonGroup, Toolbar, ...:
readonly disabled = dxOptionSignal(this.menu, 'disabled');

For state that is neither an option nor a single event (method-based APIs), implement a DxBindingAdapter and pass it to bindDxState — that is exactly how the chart-selection and tree-view directives are built. And if you want template sugar for a component we don't cover, a custom directive is ~10 lines by extending DxValueDirectiveBase, DxVisibleDirectiveBase, etc.

Semantics

• Initial sync (initialSync, default 'auto'): the signal's value is pushed into the widget on attach; if it is undefined, the widget's current value is pulled into the signal instead.
• Echo suppression: updates only propagate when the value structurally changed (Date-aware, deep for arrays/plain objects). Override per binding via equal / dxValueEqual.
• Debounce applies to the widget → signal direction only, so typing into a dx-text-box doesn't storm your computed() graph.
• Teardown is automatic via DestroyRef — event handlers are detached and effects destroyed when the directive/component dies.
• Zoneless: no NgZone, no markForCheck — signal writes are the change notification.

Type helpers

All building blocks are exported, e.g.:

DxHostOptionName<DxTextBoxComponent>          // 'value' | 'placeholder' | 'mode' | ...
DxHostOptionValue<DxTextBoxComponent, 'mode'> // 'email' | 'password' | ... | undefined
DxHostEventName<DxDataGridComponent>          // 'rowClick' | 'selectionChanged' | ...
DxHostEventArg<DxTextBoxComponent, 'valueChanged'>
DxHostValue<DxCheckBoxComponent>              // boolean | null

Development

npm run build               # ng-packagr build → dist/
npm run typecheck:examples  # strict-template check of examples/ + type contract tests
npm run verify              # both
npm run smoke               # runtime smoke test app on http://localhost:4299

The smoke app (smoke/src/smoke.component.ts) boots with provideZonelessChangeDetection() — zone.js is not even installed in this workspace — and exercises text box, select box, check box, slider, tabs, grid selection, popup visibility, chart point selection and the composition API in a real browser, with data-testid readouts for scripted verification of both binding directions.

See examples/order-dashboard.component.ts for a complete signal-driven dashboard and examples/type-tests.ts for the compile-time contract tests.