(WPF) UI best practices

Question

Hi,

we are curring analyzing whether to implement a solution for a software application by using either WPF or WinForms.

Apart from that decision, I just wanted to ask whether someone of you has good resources in terms of UI design (i.e. layout) (papers, case studies, links, books...), preferably targeted to WPF. I do not necessarily intend usability rules in general (like accessibility etc..), but more specifically on how to organize the UI.

Like this: http://healthcare.codeplex.com/

The application is a business application, not an ERP system but it goes in that direction.

Thx a lot

Juri

Answer 1

Have a look at the Model View View-Model pattern (MVVM) - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/dd419663.aspx

Here are a few other interesting links

• Josh Smith's blog for WPF - http://joshsmithonwpf.wordpress.com/
• MVVM Foundation, A class library to implement MVVM for your apps - http://mvvmfoundation.codeplex.com/

Answer 2

As well as looking into MVVM, you may want to take a look at Josh Smith's excellent Podcatcher series on Code Project. These articles talk about how to create an application, and then to apply a top-notch UI on top of it using something that Josh calls structural skinning.

Link to introductory article. Link to article describing implementation of structural skinning.

Answer 3

For UI design check out Quince from Infragistics. It´ s a user interface pattern browser with many useful patterns, descriptions, examples and so on.