Advice on using XamRibbon with Composite WPF

If, like me, you are interested in using all the new fangled controls produced by every man and his dog, you will probably have come across the Infragistics WPF control. My mission, that I stupidly accepted, was to update the TFS Sticky Buddy application with their XamRibbon and XamDockManager controls, and anything else I can stuff in there.

The “anything else” I decided to use was the Composite WPF guidance. This is a newer WPF version of the Client Application Block (CAB) packages provided by the Patterns and Practices teams at Microsoft.

Anyhoo, I though I should give some advice for those of you mixing these technologies. I seam to have licked the XamRibbon implementation, but I am still working on the XamDockManager bits.

Note: You will need to be familiar with the Composite WPF bits for this all to make sense.

   1: <igRibbon:XamRibbon  x:Name="uxXamRibbon" cal:RegionManager.RegionName="{x:Static inf:RegionNames.Shell_Ribbon}"

                           AllowMinimize="True" AutoHideEnabled="False" IsMinimized="False">

   2:         <igRibbon:XamRibbon.ApplicationMenu>

   3:           <igRibbon:ApplicationMenu cal:RegionManager.RegionName="{x:Static inf:RegionNames.Shell_RibbonApplicationMenu}"

                                           Image="/Hinshelwood.TFSStickyBuddy;component/RDIcon.ico">

   4:             <igRibbon:ApplicationMenu.FooterToolbar>

   5:               <igRibbon:ApplicationMenuFooterToolbar cal:RegionManager.RegionName="{x:Static inf:RegionNames.Shell_RibbonApplicationMenuFooterToolbar}">

   6:               </igRibbon:ApplicationMenuFooterToolbar>

   7:            </igRibbon:ApplicationMenu.FooterToolbar>

   8:         </igRibbon:ApplicationMenu>

   9:      </igRibbon:XamRibbon.ApplicationMenu>

  10: </igRibbon:XamRibbon>

As you can see there are a number of regions here, for the Tabs, the Application Menu and the FooterToolbar. You will need both a XamRibbon and a RibbonTabItem adapter.

   1: Public Class RibbonRegionAdapter

   2:     Inherits RegionAdapterBase(Of XamRibbon)

   3:

   4:     Private m_regionTarget As XamRibbon

   5:

   6:     Protected Overrides Sub Adapt(ByVal region As Microsoft.Practices.Composite.Regions.IRegion, ByVal regionTarget As XamRibbon)

   7:         m_regionTarget = regionTarget

   8:         regionTarget.Tabs.Clear()

   9:         AddHandler region.ActiveViews.CollectionChanged, AddressOf OnActiveViewsChanged

  10:         For Each v As RibbonTabItem In region.ActiveViews

  11:             regionTarget.Tabs.Add(v)

  12:         Next

  13:

  14:     End Sub

  15:

  16:     Private Sub OnActiveViewsChanged(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As NotifyCollectionChangedEventArgs)

  17:         Select Case e.Action

  18:             Case NotifyCollectionChangedAction.Add

  19:                 For Each v In e.NewItems

  20:                     m_regionTarget.Tabs.Add(v)

  21:                 Next

  22:             Case NotifyCollectionChangedAction.Remove

  23:                 For Each v In e.OldItems

  24:                     m_regionTarget.Tabs.Remove(v)

  25:                 Next

  26:         End Select

  27:     End Sub

  28:

  29:     Protected Overrides Function CreateRegion() As Microsoft.Practices.Composite.Regions.IRegion

  30:         Return New AllActiveRegion

  31:     End Function

  32:

  33: End Class

   1: Public Class RibbonTabItemRegionAdapter

   2:     Inherits RegionAdapterBase(Of RibbonTabItem)

   3:

   4:     Private m_regionTarget As RibbonTabItem

   5:

   6:     Protected Overrides Sub Adapt(ByVal region As Microsoft.Practices.Composite.Regions.IRegion, ByVal regionTarget As RibbonTabItem)

   7:         m_regionTarget = regionTarget

   8:         regionTarget.Content.Clear()

   9:         AddHandler region.ActiveViews.CollectionChanged, AddressOf OnActiveViewsChanged

  10:         For Each v As Object In region.ActiveViews

  11:             regionTarget.Content.Add(v)

  12:         Next

  13:

  14:     End Sub

  15:

  16:     Private Sub OnActiveViewsChanged(ByVal sender As Object, ByVal e As NotifyCollectionChangedEventArgs)

  17:         Select Case e.Action

  18:             Case NotifyCollectionChangedAction.Add

  19:                 For Each v In e.NewItems

  20:                     m_regionTarget.Content.Add(v)

  21:                 Next

  22:             Case NotifyCollectionChangedAction.Remove

  23:                 For Each v In e.OldItems

  24:                     m_regionTarget.Content.Remove(v)

  25:                 Next

  26:         End Select

  27:     End Sub

  28:

  29:     Protected Overrides Function CreateRegion() As Microsoft.Practices.Composite.Regions.IRegion

  30:         Return New AllActiveRegion

  31:     End Function

  32:

  33: End Class

I am pretty sure that these can be augmented, and I can think of a few Ideas already, including adding a re-parenting ability to allow menu items to be added to the XAML as well as programmatically added.

I think I might have to go away and try this…

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