Better User and Developer Experiences – From Windows Forms to WPF with MVVM: Introduction
I frequently talk to people trying to decide, for a new project, between Windows Forms and Windows Presentation Foundation. After spending time with WPF, I feel there is no reason to choose Windows Forms for new development. WPF, when used correctly, is far superior, both in terms of user experience, but also developer productivity.
I feel that the confusion around choosing WPF really stems from a lack of understanding about WPF. Even people on my own team have been overwhelmed trying to understand how the different pieces of WPF fit together, and how to apply the new concepts introduced with WPF effectively. In order to address this, I’m going to break this down into a few simple pieces, and show the migration in terms of thought required to transition from being a good Windows Forms developer to an effective WPF developer.
Using a Behavior to Aggregate Values in a Master-Detail view in M-V-VM
It is very difficult to handle situations in a master-detail view, where the master side displays a value derived from aggregating the detail collection. The Model-View-ViewModel pattern makes this even more challenging, since most means of handling this require changing your model, or using extensive code behind.
Using Behaviors to Allow the ViewModel to Manage View Lifetime in M-V-VM
One common issue people face in the Model-View-ViewModel pattern is how to cleanly deal with the lifetime of the View from within the ViewModel. Keeping all of the logic in the ViewModel for preventing the View from closing can be a daunting task, especially at first.
