ux musings : Silverlight2

A New Set of Control Skins

CorrinaB — Mon, 24 Mar 2008 05:31:00 GMT

One more set of control skins is up and ready for you to use. I had hoped to have two ready, but one set needed some additional tweaking work that I haven’t been able to finish while on vacation in Thailand, and I’m going to stop trying until I return to Seattle on 4/14.

This new set is very rough and organic in appearance, but it can still work on various sites or it can be used in early mockups of a site to give the mockups a rough and sketched appearance. I take this sort of approach to many of my early mockups; especially, if I don’t want reviewers to focus on design details.

Here’s a screen shot of the new set of controls.

You can also view a live version of the controls or download the Page.xaml, Page.xaml.cs/Page.xaml.vb, and App.xaml, so you can apply the style to your own site.

For those of you who are interested in designing your own control skins, there is a good walkthrough of how you might do this on LiquidBoy’s blog (at the start of this post there is a link to a walkthrough on creating a button control skin called “Skinning a button – 4 different ways and counting”), and you can download a Beta version of Blend to use for creating your skins on Silverlight.net (along with all of the other tools you might need).

Enjoy the new skin!

Hooking Data up to ListBox and Datagrid

CorrinaB — Mon, 17 Mar 2008 03:17:00 GMT

This is a walkthrough of how to hook data up to both ListBox and Datagrid. In this walkthrough, we'll create a small collection to use as the data source.

For this walkthrough, you'll need Visual Studio 2008, the new Microsoft Silverlight Tools Beta 1 for Visual Studio 2008, the Silverlight 2 SDK Beta 1, and the Silverlight 2 Beta 1 runtime. For Silverlight specific tools, go to Silverlight.net.

* This post walks through creating a C# project, but there is also a VB version of the code at the bottom of the post
* Delay’s blog has some great info on how to use ListBox in various ways (he covers most of the key scenarios )
* When adding ListBox and DataGrid to Page.xaml, pay attention to the capitalization in each tag (e.g. <ListBox…and <..:DataGrid…)

Create a Silverlight 2 Project

Create a new Silverlight 2 project and a web application project to host it.

Layout a ListBox

In your Silverlight project, add a reference to System.Windows.Controls.Data. This will allow us to use the Datagrid control.

Open Page.xaml and remove the height and width settings from UserControl (shown as text with a strike through below). I do this so the Silverlight content can fill the web browser page rather than be restricted to a specified width and height.

Add vertical and horizontal alignment specifications to the LayoutRoot grid control, so the grid will align center on the page. Then, add a Margin of 50, so the grid has some buffer between it and the edges of the page. Next, add two rows to the grid that are each 50% of the total grid height, and then add a ListBox control to row 0, give it an x:Name attribute of “myListBox”, and a height and width (original xaml is shown in gray and new or modified xaml is shown in full color below).

<UserControl x:Class="DataSample.Page"

xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/client/2007"

xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"

~~Width="400" Height="300"~~>

<Grid

x:Name="LayoutRoot"

Background="White"

HorizontalAlignment="Center"

VerticalAlignment="Center"

Margin="50">

<Grid.RowDefinitions>

<RowDefinition Height="50*" />

</Grid.RowDefinitions>

<ListBox x:Name="myListBox" Grid.Row="0" Height="200" Width="300"/>

</Grid>

</UserControl>

Now, run your project and you should see an empty ListBox as shown below.

Create a Collection to Fill the ListBox

We need to fill the ListBox with data, and to do this we’re going to create a collection in code. We’re going to add two new classes to Page.xaml.cs, so open the file, and add a class called Peeps with a String property for FirstName, a String property for LastName, and an int property for Age. Also, add a class called PeepsList that inherits from List<>, and fill it with as many peeps as you like. You could, of course, create two new separate class files for this if you prefer.

Next, create an instance of the PeepsList collection in the Page class’s constructor and then set the ItemSource of the ListBox to this new instance (use the x:Name attribute for the ListBox you used in the xaml file).

Here’s my sample code; the code in full color is what I added to the file to accomplish what was described above.

using System;

using System.Collections.Generic;

using System.Linq;

using System.Windows;

using System.Windows.Controls;

using System.Windows.Documents;

using System.Windows.Input;

using System.Windows.Media;

using System.Windows.Media.Animation;

using System.Windows.Shapes;

namespace DataSample

{

public partial class Page : UserControl

{

//Constructor called on page load

public Page()

{

InitializeComponent();

//When the page loads create a new list of peeps

PeepsList listData = new PeepsList();

//Set the listbox "myListBox" ItemSource to the newly created list of peeps

myListBox.ItemsSource = listData;

}

//Defines peeps item content

public class Peeps

{

//Properties

public String FirstName{ get; set; }

public String LastName{ get; set; }

public int Age{ get; set; }

//Constructor

public Peeps(String _fName, String _lName, int _Age)

{

FirstName = _fName;

LastName = _lName;

Age = _Age;

}

//Creates list of peeps to use in listbox and datagrid

public class PeepsList : List<Peeps>

{

//Constructor

public PeepsList()

{

this.Add(new Peeps("Lisa", "Martin", 19));

this.Add(new Peeps("Ilana", "James", 39));

this.Add(new Peeps("Halle", "Bora", 19));

this.Add(new Peeps("Jason", "DeVora", 29));

this.Add(new Peeps("Julie", "Jones", 10));

this.Add(new Peeps("George", "Hill", 30));

}

Now, run your project and your ListBox should look as follows.

Create an ItemTemplate to Control Presentation of Data

Our ListBox now shows the namespace and name of the Peeps class, so we need to create an ItemTemplate to control presentation of the data in the collection, and to do this you’ll need to open Page.xaml again.

We’re going to list the First Name property of each of the Peeps in our ListBox. To do this, add a ListBox.ItemTemplate tag, and inside of that add a DataTemplate tag, and inside of that add a Textblock and set the Text attribute’s Binding to FirstName, as shown below.

<UserControl x:Class="DataSample.Page"

xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/client/2007"

xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml">

<Grid

x:Name="LayoutRoot"

Background="White"

HorizontalAlignment="Center"

VerticalAlignment="Center"

Margin="50">

<Grid.RowDefinitions>

</Grid.RowDefinitions>

<ListBox.ItemTemplate>

</DataTemplate>

</ListBox.ItemTemplate>

</ListBox>

</Grid>

</UserControl>

Now, run your project and it should look as shown below.

Layout a DataGrid

Now, let’s add a Datagrid to our UI and fill it with the same data from the PeepsList. To do this, open Page.xaml and add a namespace reference to System.Windows.Controls.Data, and then add a DataGrid xaml element to the page and place it in row 1 of the grid. Be sure to add the AutoGenerateColumns =”True” attribute, so it automatically creates column headers, and give it an x:Name attribute of “myDataGrid”. The last thing to do to the DataGrid is to give it a height, width, and margin. All new xaml is shown below in full color below.

<UserControl x:Class="DataSample.Page"

xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/client/2007"

xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"

xmlns:data="clr-namespace:System.Windows.Controls;assembly=System.Windows.Controls.Data">

<Grid

x:Name="LayoutRoot"

Background="White"

HorizontalAlignment="Center"

VerticalAlignment="Center"

Margin="50">

<Grid.RowDefinitions>

</Grid.RowDefinitions>

<ListBox.ItemTemplate>

</DataTemplate>

</ListBox.ItemTemplate>

</ListBox>

<data:DataGrid x:Name="myDataGrid” Grid.Row="1" AutoGenerateColumns="True" Height="200" Width="300" Margin="10"/>

</Grid>

</UserControl>

Now, open Page.xaml.cs and set myDataGrid’s ItemSource to the new PeepsList instance just as you did for the ListBox as shown below in full color.

using System;

using System.Collections.Generic;

using System.Linq;

using System.Windows;

using System.Windows.Controls;

using System.Windows.Documents;

using System.Windows.Input;

using System.Windows.Media;

using System.Windows.Media.Animation;

using System.Windows.Shapes;

namespace DataSample

{

public partial class Page : UserControl

{

//Constructor called on page load

public Page()

{

InitializeComponent();

//When the page loads create a new list of peeps

PeepsList listData = new PeepsList();

//Set the listbox "myListBox" ItemSource to the newly created list of peeps

myListBox.ItemsSource = listData;

//Set the datagrid "myDataGrid" ItemSource to the newly created list of peeps

myDataGrid.ItemsSource = listData;

}

//Defines peeps item content

public class Peeps

{

//Properties

public String FirstName{ get; set; }

public String LastName{ get; set; }

public int Age{ get; set; }

//Contructor

public Peeps(String _fName, String _lName, int _Age)

{

FirstName = _fName;

LastName = _lName;

Age = _Age;

}

//Creates list of peeps to use in listbox and datagrid

public class PeepsList : List<Peeps>

{

//Constructor

public PeepsList()

{

this.Add(new Peeps("Lisa", "Martin", 19));

this.Add(new Peeps("Ilana", "James", 39));

this.Add(new Peeps("Halle", "Bora", 19));

this.Add(new Peeps("Jason", "DeVora", 29));

this.Add(new Peeps("Julie", "Jones", 10));

this.Add(new Peeps("George", "Hill", 30));

}

Run your application and it should look as follows.

VB Version of Code

If you prefer to code in VB, here is the VB version of the code for Page.xaml.vb

Partial Public Class Page

Inherits UserControl

Public Sub New()

InitializeComponent()

'When the page loads create a new list of peeps

Dim listData As PeepsList = New PeepsList()

'Set the listbox "myListBox" ItemSource to the newly created list of peeps

myListBox.ItemsSource = listData

'Set the listbox "myListBox" ItemSource to the newly created list of peeps

myDataGrid.ItemsSource = listData

End Sub

End Class

'Defines peeps item content

Public Class Peeps

'Properties

Private fName As String

Public Property FirstName() As String

Set(ByVal Value As String)

fName = Value

End Set

Get

Return fName

End Get

End Property

Private lName As String

Public Property LastName() As String

Set(ByVal Value As String)

lName = Value

End Set

Get

Return lName

End Get

End Property

Private aAge As Integer

Public Property Age() As Integer

Set(ByVal Value As Integer)

aAge = Value

End Set

Get

Return aAge

End Get

End Property

'Contructor

Public Sub New(ByVal _fName As String, ByVal _lName As String, ByVal _age As Integer)

firstName = _fName

lastName = _lName

age = _age

End Sub

End Class

'Creates list of peeps to use in listbox and datagrid

Public Class PeepsList

Inherits List(Of Peeps)

'Contructor

Public Sub New()

Me.Add(New Peeps("Lisa", "Martin", 19))

Me.Add(New Peeps("Ilana", "James", 39))

Me.Add(New Peeps("Halle", "Bora", 19))

Me.Add(New Peeps("Jason", "DeVora", 29))

Me.Add(New Peeps("Julie", "Jones", 10))

Me.Add(New Peeps("George", "Hill", 30))

End Sub

End Class

Now, you can apply one of the custom styles I created in my previous post to further customize the UI you just created.

Silverlight 2 Control Skins

CorrinaB — Tue, 11 Mar 2008 03:32:00 GMT

Last week, Silverlight 2 beta one was the hot topic at the Mix 08 conference that took place in Las Vegas, and rightly so, as it now has even more great functionality to offer, and you can find out about specific details on Silverlight.net or on Scott Guthrie's blog. Scott's blog also contains several very informative walkthroughs detailing how to use much of the new functionality, and I highly recommend checking it out.

One of the new aspects of Silverlight 2 that I'm most psyched about right now is the new set of controls that it has to offer; which includes...

Button
Toggle Button
Radio Button
Checkbox
Texbox
Tooltip
Hyperlink
Slider
ScrollViewer
Calendar
Datepicker
DataGrid
ListBox
etc…

The default controls look great as is, but I need variety, so a designer friend of mine and I decided to put together a few new sets of styles for the controls listed above. We now have three different sets that are ready for you to check out and two more that will be ready for consumption within the next two weeks. Here’s what we have now, and you can view the styled controls in action or download them to add to your project (Page.xaml contains my sample page layout and App.xaml contains the style definitions)….

Bubbly View Download
Red View Download
Flat View Download

The download for the Flat set of styles also contains a Page.xaml.cs, and a Page.xaml.vb file. The reason these files are there is because I'm auto generating my columns in my data grid and the only way I can control the styles for the column content is through code (I'm changing fontfamily and fontsize). If I weren't autogenerating the columns I could control the style for the column content in the way I have for every other control (in the case of datagrid, I would use ElementStyle and EditingElementStyle).

The following set of steps describe some of the ways that you can apply these styles to your project.

Apply Styles Globally

To use the styles globally in your project, open your App.xaml file and replace your <Application.Resources>...</Application.Resources> with my <Application.Resources>...</Application.Resources> for the set of styles that you are interested in using.

Then, you can utilize the styles for controls throughout your project by adding a reference to the style of interest. For example, for button you would add the bold text below to the button tag,

Apply Styles to a Particular XAML Page

To use the styles in a particular XAML page, open the page and add the following below the opening UserControl tag, <UserControl.Resources></UserControl.Resources>, and then copy and paste my styles from App.xaml into the tag (minus <Application.Resources></Application.Resources>)

Then, you can utilize the styles for controls throughout the XAML page by adding a reference to the style of interest. For example, for button you would do exactly as described in the previous example, and add the bolded text below to the button tag,

Apply a Style to a Particular Control Inline

To use a style for a particular control inline, place the style directly in the control of interest. For example, for button you would add the following to your button tag (you also need to remove the x:Key attribute from the style tag as shown in the comment below)

<Button.Style>

<Style ~~x:Key="buttonStyle"~~ TargetType="Button">-->

</Style>

</Button.Style>

</Button>

Please ping me with questions if anything is unclear.