MSDN Event: Fundamentals of WPF & WPF in the Real World

Charlie Calvert — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 21:26:14 GMT

MSDN Events will host Paul Sheriff in two free half day events in Southern California. He first talk is on the Fundamentals of WPF. It covers basic WPF concepts and working with data. Technologies discussed in the talk include working with combo boxes, list boxes, and list views. His second talk, WPF in the Real World, is designed to help people move from Windows Forms to WPF. Topics covered included toolbars, status bars and other features commonly found in Windows Forms applications. Business developers looking for best practices for developing applications will find this talk helpful.

Details

ORANGE COUNTY (IRVINE)

Fundamentals of WPF
August 24, 2009
1:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Click here to register
Event ID: 1032421370
WPF in the Real World
August 25, 2009
1:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Click here to register
Event ID: 1032421372

San Diego

Fundamentals of WPF
August 24, 2009
1:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Click here to register
Event ID: 1032421585
WPF in the Real World
August 25, 2009
1:00 pm - 5:00 pm
Click here to register
Event ID: 1032421584

To Register by Phone call 1.877.MSEVENT (1.877.673.8368).

WPF Farm: Simple WPF

Charlie Calvert — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 10:09:06 GMT

It can be helpful to start from the beginning when working with new technologies. This post explains how to create a minimal WPF application that produces a single window with a gradient in it, as shown in Figure 1. The point of this exercise is to build the app from scratch, choosing File | New Project | Empty Project rather than File | New Project | WPF Application. The benefit of this exercise is to simply see what ingredients go into the production of a minimal WPF program.

Figure 1: A Simple WPF window with a gradient.

Begin by choosing File | New Project | Empty Project from the Visual Studio 2008 menu.
Choose Project | Add Class from the menu and add a new C# class called Program.
Right click on the References section in the Solution Explorer and remove System.Data and System.Xml, but leave System. Add the following References as shown in Figure 2:
1. PresentationCore
2. PresentationFramework
3. WindowBase
Remove System.Linq and add the following to the program's using statements
1. System.Windows
2. System.Windows.Media
Use the svm snippet to add a Main method to your code and use the ctor snippet to add a constructor to your code
1. Put the [STAThread] attribute above the main method
Fill in the main method and the constructor as shown in Figure 1
Select from the menu Project | Project Properties and set the output type to Windows Application
Have class Program derive from class Window
1. class Program: Window
Optionally right click on the editor and choose Organize Usings | Remove and Sort from the menu
Press F5 to run the program. You should see the window shown in Figure 1.

Figure 2: The References section from the SimpleWpf project.

The complete source code to this project is shown in Listing 1. You can see that an Application object is created in the Main method, and that a few minimal fields of the window are filled out in the constructor. I also create a WPF LinearGradientBrush and set it as the Background for the window.

using System;
using System.Windows;
using System.Windows.Media;

namespace Project1
{
    class Program: Window
    {
        [STAThread]
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            Application application = new Application();
            application.Run(new Program());
        }

        public Program()
        {
            Width = 320;
            Height = 260;
            Title = "A Colorful Window";
            Background = new LinearGradientBrush(Colors.AliceBlue, Colors.Aquamarine,
                new Point(0, 0), new Point(1, 1));   
        }
    }
}

I should perhaps end by reminding you that the simplest way to create a WPF application in Visual Studio is to choose File | New Project | WPF Application. I have shown you this alternative technique simply because I hope you find it interesting or entertaining. It also illustrates that it is possible, though not necessarily recommended, to build WPF applications without using XAML.

The complete Source is on my LINQ Farm. Here is direct link to the download.

Charlie Calvert's Community Blog : WPF

MSDN Event: Fundamentals of WPF & WPF in the Real World

Details

WPF Farm: Simple WPF