When using a Panorama or Pivot control in your Windows Phone application, you might be tempted to allow the user to pin a specific screen of the control and hence, enable to navigate directly to it. I came across that need in some occasions as part of the applications we are helping developers to build so I came up with a small PoC to demonstrate how you can achieve this (sample code here):

It basically consists of a Main Panorama Page with 4 buttons that prove the concept of navigating specifically to a screen within a Panorama or Pivot control:

1. Navigate to a different screen in the same Panorama control:

   PanoramaControl.DefaultItem = Item2;

   
   Where PanoramaControl and Item2 are:

   <controls:Panorama x:Name="PanoramaControl" Title="my application">

       <controls:Panorama.Background>

           <ImageBrush ImageSource="PanoramaBackground.png"/>

       </controls:Panorama.Background>

       <controls:PanoramaItem Name="Item1" Header="first item">

           <StackPanel Height="354">

               <Button Content="This Panorama: item 2" Height="72" Name="thisPA2" Click="thisPA2_Click" />

               <Button Content="Other Panorama" Height="72" Name="otherPA" Click="otherPA_Click"/>

               <Button Content="Other Panorama: item 2" Height="72" Name="otherPA2" Click="otherPA2_Click" />

               <Button Content="Other Pivot: item 2" Height="72" Name="otherPV2" Click="otherPV2_Click" />

           </StackPanel>

       </controls:PanoramaItem>

       <controls:PanoramaItem Name="Item2" Header="second item">

       </controls:PanoramaItem>

   </controls:Panorama>

   Important: this approach in particular is actually NOT a navigation, so it doesn’t add a navigation point to the navigation stack.

2. Navigate to a different Panorama page: I just added this sample for completeness of the PoC, but it is the regular navigation to a page:

   NavigationService.Navigate(new Uri("/Panorama.xaml", UriKind.Relative));

3. Navigate to a different Panorama page but specifically to one of its screens, in this case the one with index 1:

   NavigationService.Navigate(new Uri("/Panorama.xaml?goto=1", UriKind.Relative));

    

   Then in Panorama.xaml.cs, I catch the navigation event, take the parameter and change the DefaultItem to be the item of MyPanorama with the specified index:

    

   protected override void OnNavigatedTo(NavigationEventArgs e)

   {

       string strItemIndex;

       if (NavigationContext.QueryString.TryGetValue("goto", out strItemIndex))

           MyPanorama.DefaultItem = MyPanorama.Items[Convert.ToInt32(strItemIndex)];

       base.OnNavigatedTo(e);

   }

4. Navigate to a different Pivot page but specifically to one of its screens, in this case the one with index 1:

   NavigationService.Navigate(new Uri("/Pivot.xaml?goto=1", UriKind.Relative));

    

   Then in Pivot.xaml.cs, I catch the navigation event, take the parameter and change MyPivot’s SelectedIndex:

    

   protected override void OnNavigatedTo(NavigationEventArgs e)

   {

       string strItemIndex;

       if (NavigationContext.QueryString.TryGetValue("goto", out strItemIndex))

           MyPivot.SelectedIndex = Convert.ToInt32(strItemIndex);

       base.OnNavigatedTo(e);

   }

Hope it helps!