WPF Docking Library (转与 The Code Project )

WPF Docking Library
Byadospace.NET.
A WPF library to easily integrate Windows docking features in applications like VS
C# (C# 2.0)
Windows, .NET (.NET 3.0)
Win32, WPF
Dev
Posted: 15 May 2007
Views: 1,581
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Introduction
Recently I started a project for porting a Windows Forms application to WPF. I was quite a novice in WPF, so at first I was considering to use a some sort of Windows Forms interoperability. In particular, the WinForm application has cool docking functionalities which obviously I wanted to port to a newer version. As I was going deep inside WPF technology I discovered a new world, which radically changed my initial ideas.
In this article I wish to share my first version of a small library which implements, without any win32-interop and in pure WPF, Windows docking feature.
Using the code
There are three fundamental classes. DockManager, Pane and ManagedContent. DockManager is a class responsible to manage main window layout. Pane represents the window area which can be docked to a border. Each Pane contains one or more ManagedContent which precisely refers to a window content of client code. Using this library is straightforward.
DockManager is a user control which can be easy embedded in window. For example, this XAML code creates a DockManager into a DockPanel:
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OK
Notice that to use DockManager you have to refer a external clr namespace (DockingLibary). Now you can add your windows to DockManager with code like this:
public partial class MainWindow : System.Windows.Window { private TreeViewWindow explorerWindow = new TreeViewWindow(); private OutputWindow outputWindow = new OutputWindow(); private PropertyWindow propertyWindow = new PropertyWindow(); private ListViewWindow listWindow = new ListViewWindow(); public MainWindow() { InitializeComponent(); } private void OnLoaded(object sender, EventArgs e) { dockManager.AddContent(explorerWindow, Dock.Right); dockManager.AddContent(outputWindow, Dock.Bottom); dockManager.AddContent(propertyWindow, Dock.Top); dockManager.AddContent(listWindow, Dock.Left); } }
That‘s all! Windows are initially docked where you set the AddContent member call. The last thing to see is how to add a document window. A document window is a particular window which can‘t be docked to the main window border, but lives only in DocumentsPane which is a particular kind of Pane. The following code adds a document window with a unique title to a DockManager:
private bool ContainsDocument(string docTitle) { foreach (DockingLibrary.DocumentContent doc in dockManager.Documents) if (string.CompareOrdinal(doc.Title, docTitle) == 0) return true; return false; } private void NewDocument(object sender, EventArgs e) { string title = "Document"; int i = 1; while (ContainsDocument(title + i.ToString())) i++; DocumentWindow doc = new DocumentWindow(); doc.Title = title+i.ToString(); dockManager.AddDocumentContent(doc); } Points of Interest
Exactly how is docking realized? I implement a simple algorithm to manage relations between windows which are docked. DockingGrid contains code to organize Pane in a logical tree. DockManager calls DockingGrid.Arrange in order to organize the window layout. You also use DockingGrid.ChangeDock when you need to dock a Pane to a main window border. The following image shows a logical tree of panes (don‘t get confused with WPF logical tree):

Each node is a group of two Panes or a Pane and a child group. To arrange layout, DockingGrid creates a WPF grid for each group with two columns or two rows, depending on split orientation. I hope the image is self-explanatory. Anyway, feel free to ask for more details if you are interested.
History
13/05/07 First preliminary release.
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