Correct way to do DataBinding in a WP7 UserControl
I'm building a Windows Phone 7 App. So, I'm using SilverLight 3(.7) and I'm having a bit of a problem with the UserControls that I've built. Here's how I'm doing it now:
UserControl has a DependencyProperty named Number
<UserControl x:Class="MyUserControl" x:Name="myUserControl">
<TextBlock Text="{Binding ElementName=myUserControl, Path=Number}"/>
</UserControl>
To use it I'm simply doing:
<MyUserControl Number="{Binding ElementName=MyPage, Path=SomeNumber}">
<MyUserControl Number="{Binding ElementName=MyPage, Path=SomeOtherNumber}">
This all works great, but if I add a name to one of the two instances of my control, things go wacky. For example:
<MyUserControl x:Name="SomeNumberControl"
Number="{Binding ElementName=MyPage, Path=SomeNumber}">
<MyUserControl Number="{Binding ElementName=MyPage, Path=SomeOtherNumber}">`
Then the data doesn't show up. It appears that the name given overrides the name specified in the UserControl and the bindings don't work.
So, I tried to do binding through the datacontext. And setting the DataContext to the UserControl.
so, my control became:
<UserControl x:Class="MyUserControl"
DataContext="{Binding RelativeSource={RelativeSource Self}}">
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Number}"/>
</UserControl>
With this nothing gets bound. It's like the datacontext is never set and even weirder when I put this control in another user control that I created, It appears that the parent control is now somehow bound to the MyUserControl instance.
So when I do the following:
<MyPage>
<MyUserControl Number={Binding SomeNumber}"/>
I get the error,
SomeNumber not found in type MyUserControl.
It's as if the binding for the parent control is now the instance of MyUserControl. Am I just doing something fundamentally wrong in how I'm doing bindings in my user control, or is this something strange with SilverLight 4 and WP7.
Any help on this is greatly appreciated.
If you have a DependecyProperty in your codebehind called Number you can set
DataContext = this;
That should allow you to bind directly to your Number property from TextBlock.
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Number}"/>