UniformGrid for Silverlight

Technorati Tags: Silverlight CustomPanel XAML UniformGrid WPF

My recent Silverlight project had a need to distribute the items in rows and columns. I had to dynamically calculate the number of columns and rows it needed based on some logic. So it was clear that I need UniformGrid as in WPF so that I can bind my ViewModel properties to Rows and Columns properties of the Panel. But it was a bit surprising to me that there isn’t a Silverlight UniformGrid either in Silverlight SDK or in Silverlight ToolKit. So here is one I ported from WPF. Check out the Silverlight 3.0 demo below.

You can also download the sample project

A Simple Accordion banner using ListBox

This sample is to show how easily we can create an Image-accordion entirely in Expression Blend. This is utilizing the ListBox’s Selected and UnSelected VisualStates. Place a ListBox and override its ItemContainerStyle then adjust the width on the Selected and UnSelected visual states. When we override the ItemsPanel we can make it orientation to Horizontal on the StackPanel. Pretty easy and there is no C# needed. Paste the below XAML in your user control

<UserControl.Resources>
<ItemsPanelTemplate x:Key="ItemsPanelTemplate1">
<StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal"/>
</ItemsPanelTemplate>
<Style x:Key="ListBoxItemStyle1" TargetType="ListBoxItem">
<Setter Property="Template">
<Setter.Value>
<ControlTemplate TargetType="ListBoxItem">
<Grid x:Name="grid" Background="{TemplateBinding Background}" Width="55">
<VisualStateManager.VisualStateGroups>
<VisualStateGroup x:Name="SelectionStates">
<VisualState x:Name="Unselected">
<Storyboard>
<DoubleAnimation Duration="0:0:0.3" To="55" Storyboard.TargetProperty="(FrameworkElement.Width)" Storyboard.TargetName="grid" >
<DoubleAnimation.EasingFunction>
<ElasticEase EasingMode="EaseIn" Springiness="6" Oscillations="0"/>
</DoubleAnimation.EasingFunction>
</DoubleAnimation>
</Storyboard>
</VisualState>
<VisualState x:Name="SelectedUnfocused">
<Storyboard>
<DoubleAnimation Duration="0:0:0.3" To="500" Storyboard.TargetProperty="(FrameworkElement.Width)" Storyboard.TargetName="grid" >
<DoubleAnimation.EasingFunction>
<ElasticEase EasingMode="EaseIn" Springiness="6" Oscillations="0" />
</DoubleAnimation.EasingFunction>
</DoubleAnimation>
</Storyboard>
</VisualState>
</VisualStateGroup>
</VisualStateManager.VisualStateGroups>
<ContentPresenter x:Name="contentPresenter" ContentTemplate="{TemplateBinding ContentTemplate}" Content="{TemplateBinding Content}"/>
<Rectangle x:Name="FocusVisualElement" RadiusY="1" RadiusX="1" Stroke="#FF6DBDD1" StrokeThickness="1" Visibility="Collapsed"/>
</Grid>
</ControlTemplate>
</Setter.Value>
</Setter>
</Style>
</UserControl.Resources>

<Grid x:Name="LayoutRoot" Background="#FFAFAFAF" Margin="10">
<ListBox SelectedIndex="0" ItemsPanel="{StaticResource ItemsPanelTemplate1}" ItemContainerStyle="{StaticResource ListBoxItemStyle1}" BorderBrush="{x:Null}" Background="{x:Null}" VerticalAlignment="Center" HorizontalAlignment="Center" Height="285" Margin="10">
<Image Source="B.JPG" Stretch="UniformToFill" Margin="0,0,1,0"/>
<Image Source="A.JPG" Stretch="UniformToFill" Margin="0,0,1,0"/>
<Image Source="C.JPG" Stretch="UniformToFill" Margin="0,0,1,0"/>
<Image Source="D.JPG" Stretch="UniformToFill" Margin="0,0,1,0"/>
<Image Source="E.JPG" Stretch="UniformToFill" Margin="0,0,1,0"/>
</ListBox>
</Grid>

Button Style - Silverlight

Really surprised to see from the google analytics that one of my old post regarding WPF control template still has many viewers . So I just thought of creating a Silverlight version of the same. All the buttons are from the same style with different Button.Background, the elliptical one has less height and more width on it.

If you want to check out the XAML, please download from here