Add WPF control at runtime

Question

I've written a WPF UserControl, and want to add one or more of it to my Window at runtime when I click a button. How can I do that?

Edit: Further specification I want to add the usercontrols to a Canvas, and put in a absolute position. The canvas is a drawing of the floors in my house, and each usercontrol has properties to indicate where in the house it is positioned. So I want all the controls to be positioned in the correct position on the canvas.

I'm thinking something like this

var light = new LightUserControl(2);
HouseCanvas.Children.Add(light); // this should be positioned in a specific place

Ian Oakes · Accepted Answer · 2008-11-22 21:46:39Z

46

After you add the your control to the Canvas you need to specify the top and left co-ordinates using the Canvas.Top and Canvas.Left attached properties as follows.

var light = new LightUserControl(2);
HouseCanvas.Children.Add(light);
Canvas.SetLeft(light, 20);
Canvas.SetTop(light, 20);

answered Nov 22, 2008 at 21:46

Ian Oakes

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6 Comments

Ed Swangren Over a year ago

After hours of working with WPF I fail to see how it is superior to WinForms. I mean really, they seem to have made simple things frustratingly difficult, complex, and implemented atop layer upon layer of abstraction. This stuff makes me want to punch myself in the face. /rant /troll /useless comment

Qwertie Over a year ago

Totally agree Ed - WPF is prettier than WinForms, and has useful features for skinning, but it's hard to learn (undiscoverable), pushes lots of errors from compile-time to run-time, etc., and other than nice graphics it has little to show for its enormous complexity. I could think of tons of ways its design could have been improved.

erodewald Over a year ago

@EdS. Impressive, literally hours with WPF and you've come to that conclusion.

Ed Swangren Over a year ago

@Erode: Yeah, I admit; it was a bit early to make that statement. I like WPF for the power it gives you. It also makes tasks which should be simple very difficult. I don't think it's a great UI platform, but not terrible either, and this is after 8 months of working on a WPF project.

Ed Swangren Over a year ago

@Erode: "For now" indeed, we'll see how WPF fares after the release of Windows 8... Also, I kind of remember making that comment. I believe it was made out of frustration after spending hours trying to get (what should have been) some simple mouse event handlers working.

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Community · Accepted Answer · 2019-06-27 10:23:50Z

13

In case you want to add the control to a Grid instead of a Canvas you can specify all the Grid properties through the Grid static class as follows:

Label newLabel = new Label();
newLabel.Content = "The New Element";
Main.Children.Add(newLabel);
Grid.SetColumn(newLabel, 0);
Grid.SetRow(newLabel, 0);

edited Jun 27, 2019 at 10:23

CommunityBot

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answered Dec 1, 2008 at 9:22

Ramiro Berrelleza

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3 Comments

hughdbrown Over a year ago

This isn't necessarily what the original questioner wanted, but it was a help to me. Thanks.

kame Over a year ago

label in the second line has to be newLabel right?

Toby Smith Over a year ago

@kame I'm guessing so

Jobi Joy · Accepted Answer · 2008-11-22 09:32:56Z

2

Add a StackPanel to the window and on each button click,

 _stackPanel.Children.Add(new YourControl());

You can do this in many ways.

edited Nov 22, 2008 at 9:32

answered Nov 22, 2008 at 9:27

Jobi Joy

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1 Comment

Frode Lillerud Over a year ago

Thanks, the .Children property was the one I needed

pinki · Accepted Answer · 2012-08-14 14:07:28Z

2

My solution:

for (i = 1; i <= buttoncount; i++)
{
    Button mybutton = new Button();
    Grid1.Children.Add(mybutton);
    mybutton.Height = 100;
    mybutton.Width = 100;
    mybutton.Name = "button" + i;
    mybutton.Content = mybutton.Name;
}

edited Aug 14, 2012 at 14:07

pinki

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answered Mar 11, 2012 at 11:04

Dhruv Singhal

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Comments

Abot Me · Accepted Answer · 2014-09-06 21:44:26Z

    public static void AddChild(this Visual parent, UIElement child)
    {
        if (InternalAddChild(parent, child))
        {
            return;
        }
        throw new NotSupportedException();
    }
    private static bool InternalAddChild(Visual parent, UIElement child)
    {
        Panel panel = parent as Panel;
        if (panel != null)
        {
            panel.Children.Add(child);
            return true;
        }
        for (int i = VisualTreeHelper.GetChildrenCount(parent) - 1; i != -1; i--)
        {
            Visual target = VisualTreeHelper.GetChild(parent, i) as Visual;
            if (target != null && InternalAddChild(target, child))
            {
                return true;
            }
        }
        return false;
    }

Cassius · Accepted Answer · 2015-04-24 19:24:21Z

0

Just complementing the answer:

for (i = 1; i <= buttoncount; i++)
{
    Button mybutton = new Button();
    Grid1.Children.Add(mybutton);
    mybutton.Height = 100;
    mybutton.Width = 100;
    mybutton.Name = "button" + i;
    mybutton.Content = mybutton.Name;
    mybutton.Click += button_Click;
}

private void button_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
    // do something
}

answered Apr 24, 2015 at 19:24

Cassius

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