I'm guessing these don't exist since I searched around for these but I'm looking for a few tools:
1) A tool that cleans up my xaml so that the properties of elements are consistent through a file. I think enforcing that consistence would make the xaml easier to read. Maybe there could be a hierarchy of what comes first but if not alphabetical might work.
Example before:
TextBox Name="myTextBox1" Grid.Row="3" Grid.Column="1" Margin="4"
TextBox Grid.Column="1" Margin="4" Name="t2" Grid.Row="3"
Example after:
TextBox Name="myTextBox1" Grid.Row="3" Grid.Column="1" Margin="4"
TextBox Name="t2" Grid.Row="3" Grid.Column="1" Margin="4"
(note < /> has been remove from the above since control seem to have issues parsing whe the after section was added)
2) Along the same lines as above, to increase readability, a tool to align properties, so from the above code example similar props would start in the same place.
<TextBox Name="myTextBox1" Grid.Row="3" Grid.Column="1" Margin="4"/>
<TextBox Name="t2" Grid.Row="3" Grid.Column="1" Margin="4"/>
I know VS has default settings for XAML documents so props can be on one line or separate lines so maybe if there was a tool as described in (1) this would not be needed...but it would still be nice if you like your props all on one line.
3) A tool that adds X to the any of the Grid.Row values and Y to any of the Grid.Column values in the selected text. Every time I add a new row\column I have to go manually fix these. From my understanding Expression Blend can help with this but seem excessive to open Blend just to increment some numbers (and just don't grok Blend). Maybe vs2010 with the designer will help but right now I'm on VS08 and Silverlight.
Any one know of any tools to help with this?
Anyone planning to write something like this...I'm looking at you JetBrains and\or DevExpress.
Thanks.
Try out Kaxaml. It has a couple auto-formatting tools like this.
Related
From a control in a WPF XAML view, I need to access the properties of another control that I can reach in the Visual Tree only when walking up to a common parent control and then down from there.
As an example:
<PageUserControl>
<Grid>
<TextBlock Text="Some example text" />
</Grid>
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Source={RelativeSource Mode=FindAncestor, AncestorType=PageUserControl, Path=??? I want to access the TextBlock}" />
</PageUserControl>
I want to access the text property of the first text block from the second text block (this is just an example).
What I would need is a way to combine relative sources, first one to go up the visual tree and find the PageUserControl, second one to go down the visual tree from there and find the grid and then finally a third one to find the text block within the grid.
Am I missing something here or is it just not possible?
I cannot add control IDs or something like this, it has to work with control types only.
I was thinking about something like a relative source that takes a XPath syntax, but it seems as if this was meant for another purpose (binding XML documents).
Maybe another idea?
Thank you!
I found a solution for my problem. It is possible using this approach:
<PageUserControl>
<Grid>
<TextBlock Text="Some example text" />
</Grid>
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Path=Children[0].Children[0].Text,
RelativeSource={RelativeSource Mode=FindAncestor, AncestorType=PageUserControl}}" />
</PageUserControl>
While not very flexible, it is good enough for me.
This is something that has bothered me for some time, and I'm not sure if it's some setting that can be turned off or not, but whenever I copy and paste something in xaml in VS 2010 it always auto-indents the line that I'm on and often the one after it for some reason. For example, say I have these lines of xaml code:
<TextBlock VerticalAlignment="Top" Foreground="Red" FontSize="11" Width="5"
Text="*" Visibility="{Binding Path=ShowInvalidFlag,UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged}" />
<TextBlock Width="Auto" Background="Transparent" Text="{Binding Path=QuestionValue}" />
and then I realize that the first TextBlock needs a Margin defined and I copy Margin="0,1,0,0" from another control within the same xaml document and paste it within the declaration of the above TextBlock it auto-indents and I end up with this:
<TextBlock VerticalAlignment="Top" Margin="0,1,0,0" Foreground="Red" FontSize="11" Width="5"
Text="*" Visibility="{Binding Path=ShowInvalidFlag,UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged}" />
<TextBlock Width="Auto" Background="Transparent" Text="{Binding Path=QuestionValue}" />
Why is it doing this? It doesn't even have to be copied from the same xaml file or even xaml code (I just tried copying random text from a text file and pasted it within the control and it still auto-indented). It's quite frustrating that every time I paste something in xaml I need to re-adjust my indentation.
Converted from comment:
If you search in the options in VS you should be able to find under Text Editor and Xaml an option for Indenting. By default it's set to "smart" which isn't always as smart as you might want it to be. Play around with that and see if it's more comfortable for you. Copy / pasting seems to be particularly prone to tripping it up.
In addition, you can also always so to "Edit" -> "Advanced" and then either "Format Document" or "Format Selection" to force Visual Studio to take another pass at formatting which may either fix, or make worse, your problem.
I think the problem is that it tries to optimize between speed and correctness. When you paste something it may not consider the entire context of where you are pasting and instead only look at the immediate parent and / or siblings which is a problem when you are pasting in a whole bunch of stuff.
So I dont really touch or have touched silverlight programming but my company has this application built in it and I have a bug they want me to fix. The issue is my text box can hold up to about 778 characters or 16 rows but then you cant view anymore of what you wrote. If you copy all you get everything you wrote even though you might only see 3/4 of it. I am not sure what I need to do, if I need to create a control panel thing for over flow or set a max length, etc. What would be my best step for this? Any good ideas?
Code:
<TextBox HorizontalAlignment="Left" Name="txtDesc" Width="300" Height="80" Grid.Column="1" Grid.Row="0" TextWrapping="Wrap" Text="{Binding Path=ExcursionDescription, Mode=TwoWay, Converter={StaticResource StripNonAsciilCharacters1}}" VerticalScrollBarVisibility="Auto" Margin="0,0,5,0"/>
I'd like a tool to visualize the Visual Hierarchy of a XAML file - just an outline of what elements are within what other elements.
I downloaded XAMLPadX 4.0 and opened a GridSplitter example file:
<Window x:Class="GridsplitterSample.Window1"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
Title="GridSplitter Sample" Height="400" Width="700">
<Grid>
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition></RowDefinition>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition></ColumnDefinition>
<ColumnDefinition></ColumnDefinition>
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<GridSplitter Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="0" HorizontalAlignment="Right" Width="4" Background="Yellow"/>
<TextBlock Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="0" Margin="0 0 4 0" Background="LightGray">Text Block</TextBlock>
<TextBlock Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="1" Background="LightGreen">Text Block 2</TextBlock>
</Grid>
</Window>
. . . This example runs and builds fine in Visual Studio 2010 but in XAMLPadX it showed nothing on the main screen and in the Visual Tree window it only expanded as far as the outer Grid element and there was no "+" to expand that any farther to show the inner Grids, TextBlocks or GridSplitter.
XamlPadX came with sample files so I loaded "Red Dragon". It displayed the XAML and a red dragon on the main screen. But now I can't get RID of the red dragon! No matter what else I load that's all I see in the main window and Visual Tree, even though different XAML is loaded in the XAML window. Red Dragon seems to have broken the tool and resrating it seems to make no difference.
So am I doing something wrong or is there a better tool?
Thanks in advance.
If you aren't already familiar than there's no other tool I know of that is nearly as handy as Expression Blend and I know normally it's frowned upon to provide answers that are only a couple sentences. However for working with XAML in WPF/SL Expression Blend is excellent once you get used to it. The Objects / Timeline and visual Properties etc. make dev so much more efficient! If you can't tell, I'm a big fan.
Or if you haven't already done so you can enable the Document Outline window in Visual Studio and it also helps quite a bit with visualizing the structure. Hope this helps.
Could use Snoop. Will attach to any compatible .NET managed app, I think it might even support some Silverlight apps. CTRL+Shift+Mouseover to highlight areas and expose them in the document hierarchy.
I'm hoping this will be my last question today. I'm in a hurry and google is not helping much (that or I'm searching the wrong places).
I created some custom properties and behaviors so my RadioButtons can alter my labels Content and the mask of my TextBoxes.
I could pass a String as a property, but how do I pass another control as a property? (AdjustedLabel is of type Label)
<RadioButton i:CPF_CNPJAdjustBehavior.LabelContent="Apple" i:CPF_CNPJAdjustBehavior.AdjustedLabel="??????????" Content="CPF" Height="16" HorizontalAlignment="Left" Margin="30,216,0,0" Name="radioButton1" VerticalAlignment="Top" GroupName="a" IsChecked="True">
<int:Interaction.Behaviors>
<i:CPF_CNPJAdjustBehavior/>
</int:Interaction.Behaviors>
</RadioButton>
<Label Content="Label" Height="28" HorizontalAlignment="Left" Margin="20,81,0,0" Name="MyLabel" VerticalAlignment="Top" />
What do I have do write in "?????????" to set AdjustedLabel to the label named "MyLabel" ?
Thanks in Advance
Clark
AdjustedLabel="{Binding ElementName=MyLabel}" will do what you're searching for.
Consider reading some documentation for getting started with WPF, Bindings, Dependency Properties and XAML syntax. You could start with XAML Syntax In Detail, Dependency Properties Overview and Data Binding Overview.