I'm creating an experimental game (which would eventually become a map editor for a game) and I'd like to include a WPF window in the same project which would communicate with the game logic. This is not another render-xna-game-in-wpf-window question, I've read tons of those, I want to spawn a seperate WPF window independent from the XNA game window, but in the same program, in the same project. When I click Add Item and select WPF, all it gives me as an option is a User Control, no window or any other options etc. I've tried referencing PresentationCore but no lock either, am I missing something? I am not super with interoperability, so forgive me if what I tried is stupid. I also don't want "hacky" solutions (like creating a window and a borderless control and setting their location same etc) if it can't be done just tell it so, but I'm sure there is a relatively "clean" way of doing it since they'll be completely seperate, think of it like a very simple MVC: M Game Logic, V XNA Window, C WPF Window. And don't offer me Forms, I know how to go with forms, but I want WPF, I just work with WPF/XAML and WPF style controls more easily.
Being able to add a Window from the Add Item menu is controlled by a Visual Studio project type GUID. Have you tried to create the window xaml and cs files manually (or create it in another, test solution and Add Existing file)? Or just create a Window instance in code and show that? Also, Window is in PresentationFramework, not PresentationCore.
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In a Silverlight application that doesn't run in a browser, is it possible to create a new top-level window? Or at least a child window?
I found some solution using the ChildWindow class, but even though my project is configured for Silverlight 4, that class can not be found.
I have a UserControl (XAML file) that I want to show as a new window. Using a tab control is not really an option unfortunately as the user has to be able to arrange windows to see more than one at once.
Any suggestions?
ChildWindow is part of the SDK, you need to add the System.Windows.Controls.dll to access the ChildWindow type.
I'm not sure you can get the ChildWindow to do what you are expecting. A ChildWindow is designed to present a window in a modal manner. However this modal behaviour is really a function of the ChildWindow template. It is possible to re-template to remove the modal behaviour. However I've never tried to manipulate multiple child windows. You could give it a go, the big question would be what happens if you close Child windows in a different order in which they were created?
In order to use a ChildWindow to present your UserControl it would probably be best for you to derive from ChildWindow, instead of UserControl. You may even find it would ultimately be better for you create base class between your specific Xaml and ChildWindow where you would put code that is common to all your windows.
I might be worth you noting the Silverlight 5 will support multiple windows.
We have a legacy application that utilizes VB6, the Flash ActiveX control, and Flash content to display animated movies to users. For plenty of reasons we're looking to migrate away from this. I'm hoping someone out there can answer a few questions about WPF so that we can make a determination about how best to move forward.
First, a little about our current architecture and needs. The Flash content is set up as separate SWF files, where each individual SWF represents a training module with animated content. We have hundreds of these modules. Users run this software in a disconnected fashion where their local machine may or may not have ALL of these SWF files. The current application gives the user the option of downloading the SWF modules as they're needed.
Here's how we're thinking about setting up a new solution using WPF and Blend. We've written a WPF host application that can dynamically show Blend content based on button presses or whatever. And we've created a few test modules in Blend as WPF custom controls. But there are three nagging questions:
Right now we have the custom controls within the main WPF solution, but we need to make these disconnected. I've read several things about using Application.LoadComponent but I don't know if that will work for our solution.
Each of the Blend custom controls contains one or more storyboards that control the animation. As soon as I add one of the custom controls to a container in the WPF app, ALL of the storyboards automatically start "playing". How can I programatically make it so that I start/stop certain storyboards as needed?
Let's say I want to change a text label in one of the custom controls. If we're dynamically loading the custom control, how would I access one of the text labels to make such a change?
Any tips would be greatly appreciated. Loving WPF so far and hoping we can make this work and say goodbye to Flash forever!!!
There is Manage Extensibility Framework, that is a standard approach for dynamic modules.
Anyway, I haven't used it, so I would answer the questions in other way:
1) No, LoadComponent is ised for xaml files, whereas custom control consist of code and xaml. I mean, the custom control that you can add using Add->New Item->Custom Control(WPF). So you should do something like this, with reflection and ContentControl:
Assembly asm = Assembly.LoadFile(#"C:\SomeLibrary.dll");
Type type = asm.GetType("SomeNamespace.SomeControl");
var control = Activator.CreateInstance(type) as Control;
this.myContentControl.Content = control;
2) It isn't fact. You can put the storyboards into Control.Resources and launch them manually.
((Storyboard)control.Resources["myStoryboard"]).Begin(control);
3)
control.FindName("anyname") as TextBlock;
I'm creating a HUD window for inspecting biz entities in my WinForms application.
I wanted to have a completely different style of window (minimize the content area and showing only the TitleBar, no system buttons, etc) so I created a WPF application for this.
The problem is that I want this Window to 'live' inside my WinForms application. I can't just add the WPF as an OwnedForm or set the main Form as the Owner of the WPF window.
So, how can achive this?
EDIT: Thanks to pst I found the answer. Here is the snippet:
System.Windows.Forms.Integration.ElementHost.EnableModelessKeyboardInterop(_inspector);
WindowInteropHelper inspectorHelper = new WindowInteropHelper(_inspector);
inspectorHelper.Owner = this.Handle;
_inspector.Show();
A WPF Window has a Win32-window handle/context.
See WindowInteropHelper. You can use this with Win32 (or perhaps there is WinForms support?) to set the owner window of the WPF Window. Be aware the handle does not exist until the "source initialized" (?) event.
However, using just WinForms, you may be able to customize the titlebar as much as you need (you can overwrite the drawing itself via Win32, and I think you lose all the control boxes without going this far).
There are lots of google results on this topic if you use the correct keywords.
Is there a way to host a WPF window inside another WPF window. I have a couple of somewhat complex forms in place. But now to simplify things I am trying to merge a few of them as tabpages inside one 'Dashboard' form.
Please note that I am not trying to host a Windows Form, but another WPF window
If you want tabpages, why not use a TabControl with UserControls inside ? If you need to transform one of these tabs to a floating window, just put the UserControl in a new Window...
Can I answer this question with another question; why would you not create them as controls rather than other WPF windows, that you want to host in the main WPF window?
a bit late on this, but I guess with WindowsForms interop you can put in WPF a WinForms control host and in that host put a WinForms control that hosts the handle of a WPF window
I think what you're asking for is MDI, Multiple Document Interface. Something like this might help.
Do note, however, that the MDI paradigm is largely shunned these days. There are usually better ways to achieve the same functionality.
I think you want to hosting contents of WPF Window1.xaml (page1.xaml) inside within another WPF Window.
Well...you can use Navigation. Instead running window1.xaml contents inside tab then you can work with your data inside Navigation. Navigation can run within WPF Window Application. You just design your form / UI in page1.xaml.
one another..MDI old and rusty. We want clear of top window nowadays.
I have an existing WinForms application for which I'm now designing new bits in WPF. Things are going reasonably well and I have run into my first need for a dialog.
I'd like to do the dialog in WPF. It appears as though I'm going to need to do a UserControl for the actual content and then host that content via a WinForms form with an ElementHost (since UserControl has no ShowDialog() method).
And that's where my question is. How does that work? Best I can tell, the WPF UserControl doesn't even have a DialogResult property (which makes sense given that it has no ShowDialog() method) - it looks to me like I'd need a WPF Window control - and I don't think I can use that in this case.
Struggling with the basic flow and setup of things here. Can someone shine a light?
Is this even possible?
You can open a WPF window from a WinForms application.
Just create the window and call ShowDialog(). The CLR will load the WPF framework and open the window.
If you want your interop application to work mostly like a WinForms app, then the approach you describe works fine -- I've pretty much the same thing in my interop cases.
WPF supports MessageBoxes (albeit a slightly different version than WinForms), and you could put something together using WPF Windows (extending it by adding something similar to DialogResult). However, the provided WPF controls suggest that they're trying to change UX interactions to minimize dialogs, particularly modal ones.
To make your life easier though, I would create a WinForms Form/ElementHost subclass specifically for dealing w/hosting WPF content, and depending on how clean you like your "using" declarations, wrapping your own DialogResult-like enumeration so you don't have to include the System.Windows.Forms namespace which can make your WPF code-behinds more cumbersome.