WPF Style Active Item - wpf

I am attempting to create a reusable navigation style Custom Control in WPF, like a navigation bar on a website. It will contain links to all the main Pages in my app. This control can go on top of all my Pages in my NavigationWindow. Giving a nice consistent look and feel across pages, like a website.
My issue is in styling the current page's link differently than the other pages' links, so that you can quickly glance at it and see which page you're on. Since the control is the same on each Page, I need to tell it which page is "active" and have it style that link appropriately.
My first thought was to simply place Is<Page>Active properties on the control, one for each page, and then set the appropriate property to true on the page. (Or I could use one property that accepts an Enum value instead of having many properties, either way)
Example:
<local:Header IsHomePageActive="True" />
Now in the control template for my Header Custom Control, I can create a DataTrigger that watches this property:
<Style.Triggers>
<DataTrigger Binding="{Binding RelativeSource FindAncestor, AncestorType={x:Type local:Header}}, Path=IsHomePageActive}" Value="true">
<Setter ... />
<Setter ... />
<Setter ... />
</DataTrigger>
</Style>
After all that background, here's my question. This works, but I'm going to have to duplicate that DataTrigger, and all the Setters in it, for every single Page I have, because the Trigger has to directly reference the "IsHomePageActive" property which only applies to the one link. So I need a different Style for every link, even though the actual STYLE its describing is exactly the same (by which I mean, the Setters are the same). The only difference is what property the trigger is watching.
Is there some way to do this (or something with the same end result) without ending up with hundreds of lines of duplicated XAML?

How about using a master/detail pattern () with a listbox(say) as the master and your pages as the details.
Then specify your style for the selected item in the list.
The page will change when a different list item is selected and it will look different to the other items.
if you have a dependency property such as List Pages where Page inherits from UserControl and has a string Title you can use
<ListBox
ItemsSource="{Binding Pages}"
IsSynchronizedWithCurrentItem="true">
<ListBox.ItemTemplate>
<DataTemplate>
<StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal">
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Title}" />
</StackPanel>
</DataTemplate>
</ListBox.ItemTemplate>
</ListBox>
<ScrollViewer VerticalScrollBarVisibility="Auto"
Content="{Binding Pages/}" />
Then just set style for the selected item on the listbox

Related

Why does my MenuItem have an Icon when I have overridden the DataTemplate?

I have successfully implement a WPF menu where the top-level items are drawn as large buttons and the lower level items are drawn as standard menu items (see my previous questions here and here).
In my original attempt at this my lower-level item template (SubItemTemplate in the example below) contained an image and a textblock. The result was something that looked like a normal menu item with an empty Icon area and the image next to the text in the text part of the menu item. I was not expecting to see the icon area in the visual display since I thought that the entire visual display would be determined by the contents of my template. The top-level template (TopLevelItemTemplate) does not have any empty icon area visible.
When I removed my image from teh lower-level template and replaced it with a style-setter for the Icon property, I got the display that I wanted.
I do not understand how and why the Icon property exists on my lower-level item DataTemplate.
Here's my code. The property HasParent is used to distinguish menu items that are not top-level (that is, the ones that are drawn with the SubItemTemplate). The section I don't understand is the DataTrigger.
Why is there an Icon property available inside that trigger?
<UserControl.Resources>
<Image x:Key="MenuIconResource16" Height="16" Width="16" Source="{Binding Icon32}" x:Shared="False" />
<HierarchicalDataTemplate x:Key="TopLevelItemTemplate" ItemsSource="{Binding Children}">
<StackPanel VerticalAlignment="Bottom" Orientation="Vertical">
<Image Width="32" Height="32" VerticalAlignment="Center" Source="{Binding Icon32}" ToolTip="{Binding UserHint}" />
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Name}"/>
</StackPanel>
</HierarchicalDataTemplate>
<HierarchicalDataTemplate x:Key="SubItemTemplate" ItemsSource="{Binding Children}">
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Name}"/>
</HierarchicalDataTemplate>
</UserControl.Resources>
<WrapPanel Height="Auto">
<Menu ItemsSource="{Binding DataContext.EventMenu.TopLevel, ElementName=UserControl}" ItemTemplateSelector="{StaticResource MenuItemTemplateSelector}">
<Menu.ItemContainerStyle>
<Style TargetType="{x:Type MenuItem}">
<Setter Property="Command" Value="{Binding Command}" />
<Setter Property="CommandParameter" Value="{Binding EventType}"/>
<Style.Triggers>
<DataTrigger Binding="{Binding HasParent}" Value="true">
<Setter Property="Icon" Value="{StaticResource MenuIconResource16}"/>
</DataTrigger>
</Style.Triggers>
</Style>
</Menu.ItemContainerStyle>
</Menu>
</WrapPanel>
I thought that the entire visual display would be determined by the contents of my template.
#dkozl noted the difference between DataTemplate and Template -- that is the important distinction. A data template is a XAML fragment that the owning control uses as part of the overall control, which may or may not include other (customizable or hard-coded) visual elements, and/or other data templates. The control template is where this visual structure of the control is defined. If you set/override a control template, then your expectation of not seeing any other visual content, will hold true.
The top-level template (TopLevelItemTemplate) does not have any empty icon area visible.
The other thing to note here is that the default style for Menu defines multiple control templates for its MenuItems. These templates are applied depending on the role "TopLevelHeader", "TopLevelItem", "SubmenuHeader", and "SubmenuItem". So you will see different behavior for these different menu items. Take a look at the default styles/templates, which should be illuminating (although they are kind of complex).
Why is there an Icon property available inside that trigger?
A style trigger has the capability of modifying any dependency property of the control it is applied to. Since the style trigger in question is being applied to the MenuItem control, it can modify the Icon dependency property, which is owned by that control.

WPF TabControl tabs losing state information

I'm fairly new to WPF and am almost positive I've just overlooked something. I'm having issues preserving the state of user controls within my tabs when I select. It seems very similar to this question but it didn't seem to get resolved.
In my main ViewModel I have an ObservableCollection of the abstract TabableViewModel class. It also implements the INotifyPropertyChanged for the TabControl's SelectedIndex.
I want the TabControl's content to be automatically created so I used a DataTemplate like so:
<Window.Resources>
<DataTemplate DataType="{x:Type vm:EasyViewModel}">
<UserControls:EasyControl/>
</DataTemplate>
<DataTemplate DataType="{x:Type vm:ComplicatedViewModel}">
<UserControls:ComplicatedControl/>
</DataTemplate>
<DataTemplate x:Key="TabHeaderTemplate">
<Grid>
<TextBlock Text="{Binding HeaderText}" />
</Grid>
</DataTemplate>
<Style x:Key="TabItemStyle" TargetType="TabItem">
<Setter Property="Header" Value="{Binding}" />
<Setter Property="HeaderTemplate" Value="{StaticResource TabHeaderTemplate}" />
<Setter Property="Content" Value="{Binding}" />
</Style>
</Window.Resources>
<TabControl x:Name="contentTab" TabStripPlacement="Bottom"
SelectedIndex="{Binding SelectedTabIndex, Mode=TwoWay}"
ItemsSource="{Binding TabItems, Mode=TwoWay}"
ItemContainerStyle="{StaticResource TabItemStyle}">
</TabControl>
EasyControl and ComplicatedControl both have a number of text boxes, combo boxes and other fields. Both ViewModels extend the TabableViewModel class and implement INotifyPropertyChanged.
In a typical test the ObservableCollection will contain one instance of EasyViewModel and then two instances of ComplicatedViewModel. The tabs build themselves properly, but the state of the ViewModels is not being maintained.
If I make changes inside EasyControl, switch to the first ComplicatedControl tab and then switch back, all data has been lost.
If I make changes to the first ComplicatedControl and switch to the second, I get those same changes instead of a blank slate. If I then switch to EasyControl and back again, all data is once again cleared.
I've seen quite a few examples where the DataTemplates are basic, but I haven't seen any where UserControls are picked based on ViewModel type. Is there anything special I have to do to maintain state?
I don't want to break the MVVM pattern by creating the UIElements within the ViewModels. I'm also hoping that I don't have to extend any Tab controls to get this working, but I will if I have to. I'm surprised it's this hard to do.
So you have a situation where your UI seems to be losing data. This is generally not possible when using MVVM because your data is in your view model and not the view. Therefore, if it is being reset at any point, then it is your code that is resetting it. You said:
My problem comes from switching between tabs
So at the point when you switch tabs, you must initialise one of your view models and that's why it loses its data. You're the only one that can fix this problem... it is not reproducible from your code example. Search for calls to your view model constructor and you should find your problem.

WPF ComboBox: How to you utilise a generic ItemContainerStyle with binding

I want to utilise a generic style for my ComboBoxItem content and have the text content bound to different properties on my underlying class. So this is the best I can come up with but the bindings are hard coded. So for every class bound to a combobox using this ItemContainerStyle I'd have to implement a "MainText" and "SubText" property.
Question is, is there a way to have the binding soft coded so where the style referenced from a combobox I can specify which string properties of the underlying class are used.
<Style TargetType="{x:Type ComboBoxItem}" x:Key="ComboBoxItemStyleA1">
<Setter Property="Template" >
<Setter.Value>
<ControlTemplate TargetType="ComboBoxItem">
<Border x:Name="BB" Padding="8,3,8,3" Background="DarkGreen">
<StackPanel Margin="0">
<TextBlock Foreground="White" FontSize="16" Text="{Binding MainText}"/>
<TextBlock Foreground="White" FontSize="8" Text="{Binding SubText}"/>
</StackPanel>
</Border>
<ControlTemplate.Triggers>
<Trigger Property="IsSelected" Value="True">
<Setter Property="Background" TargetName="BB" Value="#FF256294"/>
<Setter Property="Foreground" Value="White"/>
</Trigger>
</ControlTemplate.Triggers>
</ControlTemplate>
</Setter.Value>
</Setter>
</Style>
And to use the style...
<ComboBox ItemsSource="{Binding Items}"
ItemContainerStyle="{StaticResource ComboBoxItemStyleA1}" />
Further to dowhilefor's answer (many many thanks - WPF is great but sure is a voyage of discovery)
I used a data template to define the cell look originally - and then wanted to use a comboboxitem based style with a control template defined where I could specify the onmouseover triggers. i.e. these were to change the background color etc.
Butj
a) I couldn't remove the Border section of the template above - the triggers are tied to it by targettype="BB". so I kind of wanted to get the trigger bound to the container such that the datatemplate would pick up the background from the template binding but not sure how to get this plumbed in.
b) I realised that even if I comment out the BB specific bindings on the triggers just to get it to run - the combobox doesn't find and use the DataTemplate I defined. Seems that defining the controltemplate in my comboboxitemstyle stops it picking up the datatemplate.
I hope I make sense here - bottom line is I just want a style that I can apply with triggers in that set the background color of my cobobox item. It should not know what the data is - i.e. be able to plug in a datatemplate that will (template ?) bind to this background color.
Many thanks for the very fast response.
btw I'm using ItemContainerStyle in conjuction with ItemTemplate so I can have a different representation in the dropdown to what appears in the combobox list
First of all don't use the ItemContainerStyle for that. To be more precise never have any Bindings to the datacontext inside an ItemContainerStyle, at least try not. Why? The Style is used for defining the appearance of a combobox item disregarding the content. If you want to define how the content should look like, you use a DataTemplate for that. There are multiple ways to tell the combobox where he can find a proper DataTemplate for the Data you supply. Checkout the property ItemTemplate, ItemTemplateSelector and search for implicit styles, to find out more about them.
So to your problem, create one ItemContainerStyle for you combobox (if you really have to anymore) which doesn't care about the object that will be put into. Now you still need to provide multiple DataTemplates each and everyone with the knowledge of the data object that you want to be templated. There is no way around it, there is no soft databinding. Just try to keep your templates small and simple. If for some reason you need the exact same template, but your properties are just named differently, why not use a wrapper item for the DataContext with the properties Caption, Description and you can decide in code how these properties are filled with your real data wrapped into this object.

Shortcut to a control in WPF

I have a TabControl with multiple TabItems. In each TabItem there needs to be this particular UserControl. Right now I'm creating X instances of the control where X is the number of TabItems I have. So this seems like a bad way to do it. So I'm wondering is there a way to have 1 instance of a control, but multiple locations for it. I know that each control can only have one parent so it seems like the answer is no.
[TabItem1]
[CommandLine Control]
[Content unique to TabItem1]
[TabItem2]
[CommandLine Control]
[Content unique to TabItem2]
Is it possible to have one instance of [CommandLine Control] but in these two locations?
If you use a data template for your control and databind the tab control to a collection then the framework will only create one instance of the control and swap out its data context as you change tab items.
You can find a more detailed discussion here: Why do tab controls reuse View instances when changing tab
You can achieve this using triggers which ensure that the control is not in two places at the same time, e.g.
<TabControl>
<TabControl.Resources>
<!-- Define control which is to be reused in resources -->
<TextBox x:Key="SharedTB" Text="test"/>
<!-- This style gets the shared control only if the parent
TabItem is selected -->
<Style x:Key="LoadTBStyle" TargetType="{x:Type ContentControl}">
<Style.Triggers>
<DataTrigger Binding="{Binding RelativeSource={RelativeSource AncestorType=TabItem}, Path=IsSelected}"
Value="True">
<Setter Property="Content" Value="{StaticResource SharedTB}"/>
</DataTrigger>
</Style.Triggers>
</Style>
</TabControl.Resources>
<TabItem Header="TabItem 1">
<StackPanel>
<TextBlock Text="Lorem Ipsum"/>
<ContentControl Style="{StaticResource LoadTBStyle}"/>
</StackPanel>
</TabItem>
<TabItem Header="TabItem 2">
<StackPanel>
<TextBlock Text="Dolor Sit"/>
<ContentControl Style="{StaticResource LoadTBStyle}"/>
</StackPanel>
</TabItem>
</TabControl>
Is the control really more or less a shared control? I mean, if you are really wanting a control to be in more places than 1, then you would be better off hosting it outside of the TabItem so that it can be accessed from any of the tab items that need it.
From your example, it looks like you might be best off spawning the items. Personally I would have the TabControls Items property bound to a collection of ViewModels that host a TabItem. Each of those would have a runtime created instance of the UserControl (with associated ViewModel and content).
It sounds like what you are looking to do can be accomplished by using a template.
Look at this link for an example of a tabitem template: http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms752032.aspx
There's no way to have a "shortcut" to it the way you describe that I'm aware of, because your user control can only have one parent.
The only thing that I can think of to do is to shift it manually (via code-behind) when the user clicks on a different tab. But the "stutter" that might cause as you shift it (while better in WPF, I'd imagine than in other frameworks) might be just as bad as whatever the resource usage problems you're seeing by having multiple instances of the user control.
I guess another thing to do would be to cache the creation of the user controls so they're only loaded if the person actually clicks on the tab.

How do I apply a DataTemplate in a Dynamic Grid?

I have a Grid. The grid's columns are auto-generated at run-time based on the user's selection.
I need the cells in the grid to be red if the content is a negative number.
I have created a DataTemplateSelector. The DataTemplateSelector get's correctly called and returns my template if the cell is negative.
Since my columns are auto-generated, I cannot simply put the correct field in the binding in my template.
<DataTemplate x:Key="MontantNegatifTemplate">
<TextBlock Foreground="Red" Text="{Binding}" />
</DataTemplate>
If I do a Template like this the text is the name of the object the grid is bound on.
If I do something like:
<DataTemplate x:Key="MontantNegatifTemplate">
<TextBlock Foreground="Red" />
</DataTemplate>
The cell is empty since the Textblock seems to overwrite the standard auto-generated cell.
Is there a way to make this work? Should I use another approach?
I finally found the awnser to my question.
I needed to use a StyleSelector rather than a DataTemplateSelector.
In the same way I needed to define a Style instead of a DataTemplate in my Grid resources.
<style:NegativeStyleSelector x:Key="NegativeStyleSelector">
<style:NegativeStyleSelector.NegativeStyle>
<Style TargetType="GridViewCell">
<Setter Property="Foreground" Value="Red"/>
</Style>
</style:NegativeStyleSelector.NegativeStyle>
</style:NegativeStyleSelector>

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