C# – How should the ViewModel close the form

cmvvmwpf

I'm trying to learn WPF and the MVVM problem, but have hit a snag.
This question is similar but not quite the same as this one (handling-dialogs-in-wpf-with-mvvm)…

I have a "Login" form written using the MVVM pattern.

This form has a ViewModel which holds the Username and Password, which are bound to the view in the XAML using normal data bindings.
It also has a "Login" command which is bound to the "Login" button on the form, agan using normal databinding.

When the "Login" command fires, it invokes a function in the ViewModel which goes off and sends data over the network to log in. When this function completes, there are 2 actions:

  1. The login was invalid – we just show a MessageBox and all is fine

  2. The login was valid, we need to close the Login form and have it return true as its DialogResult…

The problem is, the ViewModel knows nothing about the actual view, so how can it close the view and tell it to return a particular DialogResult?? I could stick some code in the CodeBehind, and/or pass the View through to the ViewModel, but that seems like it would defeat the whole point of MVVM entirely…

Update

In the end I just violated the "purity" of the MVVM pattern and had the View publish a Closed event, and expose a Close method. The ViewModel would then just call view.Close. The view is only known via an interface and wired up via an IOC container, so no testability or maintainability is lost.

It seems rather silly that the accepted answer is at -5 votes! While I'm well aware of the good feelings that one gets by solving a problem while being "pure", Surely I'm not the only one that thinks that 200 lines of events, commands and behaviors just to avoid a one line method in the name of "patterns" and "purity" is a bit ridiculous….

Best Answer

I was inspired by Thejuan's answer to write a simpler attached property. No styles, no triggers; instead, you can just do this:

<Window ...
        xmlns:xc="clr-namespace:ExCastle.Wpf"
        xc:DialogCloser.DialogResult="{Binding DialogResult}">

This is almost as clean as if the WPF team had gotten it right and made DialogResult a dependency property in the first place. Just put a bool? DialogResult property on your ViewModel and implement INotifyPropertyChanged, and voilà, your ViewModel can close the Window (and set its DialogResult) just by setting a property. MVVM as it should be.

Here's the code for DialogCloser:

using System.Windows;

namespace ExCastle.Wpf
{
    public static class DialogCloser
    {
        public static readonly DependencyProperty DialogResultProperty =
            DependencyProperty.RegisterAttached(
                "DialogResult",
                typeof(bool?),
                typeof(DialogCloser),
                new PropertyMetadata(DialogResultChanged));

        private static void DialogResultChanged(
            DependencyObject d,
            DependencyPropertyChangedEventArgs e)
        {
            var window = d as Window;
            if (window != null)
                window.DialogResult = e.NewValue as bool?;
        }
        public static void SetDialogResult(Window target, bool? value)
        {
            target.SetValue(DialogResultProperty, value);
        }
    }
}

I've also posted this on my blog.

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