Wpf – How to make an ItemsControl stretch to fill all available space

itemscontrolresizewpfxaml

I have an ItemsControl, with its ItemsSource bound to a list of items. The size of each of the items is as small as they can be, what I need is for the control and the items in the control to stretch to fit all available space.

I tried setting VerticalAlignment to Stretch on both the control, and its items (using a style). I also tried wrapping the ItemsControl in a DockPanel, and docking the ItemsControl to the bottom. How do I have the ItemsControl dynamically resize?

Also some, but not all, of the item's visibilities are set to Collapsed (through the same style). Will that be a factor in how this needs to be done?

<DockPanel HorizontalAlignment="Stretch">
    <ItemsControl DockPanel.Dock="Bottom"
                    ItemsSource="{Binding Owner.LoadPointCharts}"
                    HorizontalAlignment="Stretch"
                    x:Name="ItemsControl">
        <ItemsControl.ItemContainerStyle><!--Height="{Binding Path=Height, RelativeSource={RelativeSource AncestorType={x:Type DockPanel}}}"-->
            <Style TargetType="ContentPresenter">
            <Setter Property="VerticalAlignment"
                    Value="Stretch" />

                <Setter Property="Visibility">
                <Setter.Value>
                    <MultiBinding Converter="{StaticResource CompareIndexToVisibilityConverter}">
                        <Binding Path="Index" />
                        <Binding Path="SelectedIndex" />
                    </MultiBinding>
                </Setter.Value>
            </Setter>
            </Style >
        </ItemsControl.ItemContainerStyle>
        </ItemsControl>
</DockPanel>

Best Answer

The accepted answer is a little too complex in my opinion. Also setting the positions of your items in a Grid can be annoying. UniformGrid is what you need.

<ItemsControl>
    <ItemsControl.ItemsPanel>
        <ItemsPanelTemplate>
            <UniformGrid Rows="1"/>
        </ItemsPanelTemplate>
    </ItemsControl.ItemsPanel>
</ItemsControl>

Related Solutions

Wpf – How to get controls in WPF to fill available space

There are also some properties you can set to force a control to fill its available space when it would otherwise not do so. For example, you can say:

HorizontalContentAlignment="Stretch"

... to force the contents of a control to stretch horizontally. Or you can say:

HorizontalAlignment="Stretch"

... to force the control itself to stretch horizontally to fill its parent.

Wpf – How to get StackPanel’s children to fill maximum space downward

It sounds like you want a StackPanel where the final element uses up all the remaining space. But why not use a DockPanel? Decorate the other elements in the DockPanel with DockPanel.Dock="Top", and then your help control can fill the remaining space.

XAML:

<DockPanel Width="200" Height="200" Background="PowderBlue">
    <TextBlock DockPanel.Dock="Top">Something</TextBlock>
    <TextBlock DockPanel.Dock="Top">Something else</TextBlock>
    <DockPanel
        HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" 
        VerticalAlignment="Stretch" 
        Height="Auto" 
        Margin="10">

      <GroupBox 
        DockPanel.Dock="Right" 
        Header="Help" 
        Width="100" 
        Background="Beige" 
        VerticalAlignment="Stretch" 
        VerticalContentAlignment="Stretch" 
        Height="Auto">
        <TextBlock Text="This is the help that is available on the news screen." 
                   TextWrapping="Wrap" />
     </GroupBox>

      <StackPanel DockPanel.Dock="Left" Margin="10" 
           Width="Auto" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch">
          <TextBlock Text="Here is the news that should wrap around." 
                     TextWrapping="Wrap"/>
      </StackPanel>
    </DockPanel>
</DockPanel>

If you are on a platform without DockPanel available (e.g. WindowsStore), you can create the same effect with a grid. Here's the above example accomplished using grids instead:

<Grid Width="200" Height="200" Background="PowderBlue">
    <Grid.RowDefinitions>
        <RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
        <RowDefinition Height="*"/>
    </Grid.RowDefinitions>
    <StackPanel Grid.Row="0">
        <TextBlock>Something</TextBlock>
        <TextBlock>Something else</TextBlock>
    </StackPanel>
    <Grid Height="Auto" Grid.Row="1" Margin="10">
        <Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
            <ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
            <ColumnDefinition Width="100"/>
        </Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
        <GroupBox
            Width="100"
            Height="Auto"
            Grid.Column="1"
            Background="Beige"
            Header="Help">
            <TextBlock Text="This is the help that is available on the news screen." 
              TextWrapping="Wrap"/>
        </GroupBox>
        <StackPanel Width="Auto" Margin="10" DockPanel.Dock="Left">
            <TextBlock Text="Here is the news that should wrap around." 
              TextWrapping="Wrap"/>
        </StackPanel>
    </Grid>
</Grid>

Related Topic

WPF Binding from within a ItemsControl – FindAncestor not working