WPF Binding Problem - Does not work!?!

Question

Hi there,

I want to bind some properties from my code-behind .xaml.cs to some xaml-code, just like this:

<TextBlock [someProperties] ... Text="{Binding ElementName=awesome, Path=value}" />
<TextBlock [someProperties] ... Text="{Binding Path=legendary}" />

In the associated .xaml.cs file I have the property:

public String legendary = "High five";
public CoolObject awesome = new CoolObject(); //has a public property "String value = '5';"

But my TextBlocks just don't want to show that damn "High five" and "5". What am I missing?

Answer 1

The problem is that "legendary" and "awesome" are declared as fields not properties. WPF binding will not work with fields.

Answer 2

You'll need to wrap your fields with properties. Binding doesn't support fields.

So:

public String _legendary = "High five";
public String legendary {
    get { return _legendary; }
    set { _legendary = value; }
 }

Also, if you might want to look into implementing INotifyPropertyChanged to make sure whatever you're binding to your property gets updated when you change the value of the property.

Answer 3

And <TextBlock [someProperties] ... Text="{Binding ElementName=awesome, Path=value}" /> will not work. ElementName is used, when you want to bind to some elemnt's in visual tree property. You need

<TextBlock [someProperties] ... Text="{Binding Path=awesome.value}" />

Also you need to set TextBlock's DataContext property to bject that contains properties you need to bind.