WPF ComboBox not updating source

comboboxdata-bindingwpfwpftoolkit

I'm trying to get a WPF combobox working (inside the WPFToolkit Datagrid), and I'm having trouble getting all the pieces aligned correctly. I'm using Linq to Entities, and I'm setting the overall datacontext to the results of a Linq query:


private void LoadDonationGrid()
{
    donationGrid.ItemsSource = from donations in entities.Donation
                   .Include("Family")
                   .Include("PledgeYear")
                   .Include("DonationPurpose")
               from donationPurposes in entities.DonationPurpose
               select new { donations, donationPurposes };
}

I also have a page property in my code-behind which provides the ItemsSource for the combobox:


private IEnumerable donationPurposeList;
public IEnumerable DonationPurposeList
{
    get
    {
        if (donationPurposeList == null)
        {
            donationPurposeList = from dp in entities.DonationPurpose
                                  select dp;
        }
        return donationPurposeList.ToList();
    }
}

The XAML for the combobox looks like this:

<tk:DataGridTemplateColumn Header="Purpose">
    <tk:DataGridTemplateColumn.CellTemplate>
        <DataTemplate>
            <TextBlock Text="{Binding Path=donations.DonationPurpose.Description, Mode=TwoWay}" />
        </DataTemplate>
    </tk:DataGridTemplateColumn.CellTemplate>
    <tk:DataGridTemplateColumn.CellEditingTemplate>
        <DataTemplate>
            <ComboBox Name="cboDonationPurpose"
                SelectedValue="{Binding Path=donations.DonationPurposeID, Mode=TwoWay}"
                ItemsSource="{Binding RelativeSource={RelativeSource AncestorType={x:Type Page},Mode=FindAncestor},Path=DonationPurposeList}"                                 
                DisplayMemberPath="Description"
                SelectedValuePath="DonationPurposeID"
                      />
        </DataTemplate>
    </tk:DataGridTemplateColumn.CellEditingTemplate>
</tk:DataGridTemplateColumn>

And everything seems to work correctly, i.e., the appropriate values are displayed in the ComboBox, right up to the point where focus leaves the ComboBox. At that point, the displayed value returns to the original value, not to the newly selected value. I've tried using SelectedItem instead of SelectedValue, but that ends up with the selected value not showing in the ComboBox. I'm kinda mystified: it seems like this bit should be working.

Edited 3/2/09: I'm still puzzling over this. I should note that in my datagrid, any simple data columns (e.g., "DataGridTextColumn") update the underlying data source just as you'd expect. But any update to any of my templated columns ("DataGridTemplateColumn") or ComboBox columns ("DataGridComboBoxColumn") don't work: the underlying data source never gets updated. Surely other folks have tried to use the WPF.Toolkit datagrid and gotten this scenario to work — but I've looked at all the sample code out there, and I'm doing basically what it says to do (within the constraints of my solution), so I'm scratching my head why this isn't working.

Any thoughts?

Best Answer

I had a similar problem (on which I spent days of frustration), and I found that changing the UpdateSourceTrigger on the SelectedValue binding to PropertyChanged fixed it. I don't know why, but for me, the datasource wasn't being updated until I made this change.

<ComboBox 
    ItemsSource="{Binding RelativeSource={RelativeSource FindAncestor, AncestorType={x:Type UpdateTypesManager:MainWindow}}, Path=CardinalityTypes}" 
    DisplayMemberPath="CardinalityType"
    SelectedValue="{Binding CardinalityTypeId, UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged}"
    SelectedValuePath="Id" />

Related Solutions

C# – Binding a WPF ComboBox to a custom list

You set the DisplayMemberPath and the SelectedValuePath to "Name", so I assume that you have a class PhoneBookEntry with a public property Name.

Have you set the DataContext to your ConnectionViewModel object?

I copied you code and made some minor modifications, and it seems to work fine. I can set the viewmodels PhoneBookEnty property and the selected item in the combobox changes, and I can change the selected item in the combobox and the view models PhoneBookEntry property is set correctly.

Here is my XAML content:

<Window x:Class="WpfApplication6.Window1"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        Title="Window1" Height="300" Width="300">
<Grid>
    <StackPanel>
        <Button Click="Button_Click">asdf</Button>
        <ComboBox ItemsSource="{Binding Path=PhonebookEntries}"
                  DisplayMemberPath="Name"
                  SelectedValuePath="Name"
                  SelectedValue="{Binding Path=PhonebookEntry}" />
    </StackPanel>
</Grid>
</Window>

And here is my code-behind:

namespace WpfApplication6
{

    /// <summary>
    /// Interaction logic for Window1.xaml
    /// </summary>
    public partial class Window1 : Window
    {
        public Window1()
        {
            InitializeComponent();
            ConnectionViewModel vm = new ConnectionViewModel();
            DataContext = vm;
        }

        private void Button_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
        {
            ((ConnectionViewModel)DataContext).PhonebookEntry = "test";
        }
    }

    public class PhoneBookEntry
    {
        public string Name { get; set; }

        public PhoneBookEntry(string name)
        {
            Name = name;
        }

        public override string ToString()
        {
            return Name;
        }
    }

    public class ConnectionViewModel : INotifyPropertyChanged
    {
        public ConnectionViewModel()
        {
            IList<PhoneBookEntry> list = new List<PhoneBookEntry>();
            list.Add(new PhoneBookEntry("test"));
            list.Add(new PhoneBookEntry("test2"));
            _phonebookEntries = new CollectionView(list);
        }

        private readonly CollectionView _phonebookEntries;
        private string _phonebookEntry;

        public CollectionView PhonebookEntries
        {
            get { return _phonebookEntries; }
        }

        public string PhonebookEntry
        {
            get { return _phonebookEntry; }
            set
            {
                if (_phonebookEntry == value) return;
                _phonebookEntry = value;
                OnPropertyChanged("PhonebookEntry");
            }
        }

        private void OnPropertyChanged(string propertyName)
        {
            if (PropertyChanged != null)
                PropertyChanged(this, new PropertyChangedEventArgs(propertyName));
        }
        public event PropertyChangedEventHandler PropertyChanged;
    }
}

Edit: Geoffs second example does not seem to work, which seems a bit odd to me. If I change the PhonebookEntries property on the ConnectionViewModel to be of type ReadOnlyCollection, the TwoWay binding of the SelectedValue property on the combobox works fine.

Maybe there is an issue with the CollectionView? I noticed a warning in the output console:

System.Windows.Data Warning: 50 : Using CollectionView directly is not fully supported. The basic features work, although with some inefficiencies, but advanced features may encounter known bugs. Consider using a derived class to avoid these problems.

Edit2 (.NET 4.5): The content of the DropDownList can be based on ToString() and not of DisplayMemberPath, while DisplayMemberPath specifies the member for the selected and displayed item only.

WPF Combobox DisplayMemberPath

DisplayMemberPath specifies the path to the display string property for each item. In your case, you'd set it to "Name", not "{Binding Name}".

Best Answer

Related Solutions

C# – Binding a WPF ComboBox to a custom list

WPF Combobox DisplayMemberPath

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