Is it easily possible to specify a margin and/or padding for rows or columns in a WPF Grid?
I could of course add extra columns to space things out, but this seems like a job for padding/margins (it will give much simplier XAML). Has someone derived from the standard Grid to add this functionality?
RowDefinition and ColumnDefinition are of type ContentElement, and Margin is strictly a FrameworkElement property. So to your question, "is it easily possible" the answer is a most definite no. And no, I have not seen any layout panels that demonstrate this kind of functionality.
You can add extra rows or columns as you suggested. But you can also set margins on a Grid element itself, or anything that would go inside a Grid, so that's your best workaround for now.
Use a Border control outside the cell control and define the padding for that:
<Grid>
<Grid.Resources >
<Style TargetType="Border" >
<Setter Property="Padding" Value="5,5,5,5" />
</Style>
</Grid.Resources>
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition/>
<RowDefinition/>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<Border Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="0">
<YourGridControls/>
</Border>
<Border Grid.Row="1" Grid.Column="0">
<YourGridControls/>
</Border>
</Grid>
Source:
Original Source
and from Way Back Machine
You could use something like this:
<Style TargetType="{x:Type DataGridCell}">
<Setter Property="Padding" Value="4" />
<Setter Property="Template">
<Setter.Value>
<ControlTemplate TargetType="{x:Type DataGridCell}">
<Border Padding="{TemplateBinding Padding}" BorderBrush="{TemplateBinding BorderBrush}" BorderThickness="{TemplateBinding BorderThickness}" Background="{TemplateBinding Background}" SnapsToDevicePixels="True">
<ContentPresenter SnapsToDevicePixels="{TemplateBinding SnapsToDevicePixels}"/>
</Border>
</ControlTemplate>
</Setter.Value>
</Setter>
Or if you don't need the TemplateBindings:
<Style TargetType="{x:Type DataGridCell}">
<Setter Property="Template">
<Setter.Value>
<ControlTemplate TargetType="{x:Type DataGridCell}">
<Border Padding="4">
<ContentPresenter />
</Border>
</ControlTemplate>
</Setter.Value>
</Setter>
</Style>
Thought I'd add my own solution because nobody yet mentioned this. Instead of designing a UserControl based on Grid, you can target controls contained in grid with a style declaration. Takes care of adding padding/margin to all elements without having to define for each, which is cumbersome and labor-intensive.For instance, if your Grid contains nothing but TextBlocks, you can do this:
<Style TargetType="{x:Type TextBlock}">
<Setter Property="Margin" Value="10"/>
</Style>
Which is like the equivalent of "cell padding".
Edited:
To give margin to any control you could wrap the control with border like this
<!--...-->
<Border Padding="10">
<AnyControl>
<!--...-->
I am surprised I did not see this solution posted yet.
Coming from the web, frameworks like bootstrap will use a negative margin to pull back rows / columns.
It might be a little verbose (albeit not that bad), it does work and the elements are evenly spaced and sized.
In the example below I use a StackPanel root to demonstrate how the 3 buttons are evenly spaced using margins. You could use other elements, just change the inner x:Type from button to your element.
The idea is simple, use a grid on the outside to pull the margins of elements out of their bounds by half the amount of the inner grid (using negative margins), use the inner grid to evenly space the elements with the amount you want.
Update:
Some comment from a user said it doesn't work, here's a quick video demonstrating: https://youtu.be/rPx2OdtSOYI
<StackPanel>
<Grid>
<Grid.Resources>
<Style TargetType="{x:Type Grid}">
<Setter Property="Margin" Value="-5 0"/>
</Style>
</Grid.Resources>
<Grid>
<Grid.Resources>
<Style TargetType="{x:Type Button}">
<Setter Property="Margin" Value="10 0"/>
</Style>
</Grid.Resources>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition Width="*" />
<ColumnDefinition Width="*" />
<ColumnDefinition Width="*" />
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<Button Grid.Column="0" Content="Btn 1" />
<Button Grid.Column="1" Content="Btn 2" />
<Button Grid.Column="2" Content="Btn 3" />
</Grid>
</Grid>
<TextBlock FontWeight="Bold" Margin="0 10">
Test
</TextBlock>
</StackPanel>
You could write your own GridWithMargin class, inherited from Grid, and override the ArrangeOverride method to apply the margins
I did it right now with one of my grids.
First apply the same margin to every element inside the grid. You can do this mannualy, using styles, or whatever you like. Lets say you want an horizontal spacing of 6px and a vertical spacing of 2px. Then you add margins of "3px 1px" to every child of the grid.
Then remove the margins created around the grid (if you want to align the borders of the controls inside the grid to the same position of the grid). Do this setting a margin of "-3px -1px" to the grid. That way, other controls outside the grid will be aligned with the outtermost controls inside the grid.
I ran into this problem while developing some software recently and it occured to me to ask WHY? Why have they done this...the answer was right there in front of me. A row of data is an object, so if we maintain object orientation, then the design for a particular row should be seperated (suppose you need to re-use the row display later on in the future). So I started using databound stack panels and custom controls for most data displays. Lists have made the occasional appearance but mostly the grid has been used only for primary page organization (Header, Menu Area, Content Area, Other Areas). Your custom objects can easily manage any spacing requirements for each row within the stack panel or grid (a single grid cell can contain the entire row object. This also has the added benefit of reacting properly to changes in orientation, expand/collapses, etc.
<Grid>
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition />
<RowDefinition />
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<custom:MyRowObject Style="YourStyleHereOrGeneralSetter" Grid.Row="0" />
<custom:MyRowObject Style="YourStyleHere" Grid.Row="1" />
</Grid>
or
<StackPanel>
<custom:MyRowObject Style="YourStyleHere" Grid.Row="0" />
<custom:MyRowObject Style="YourStyleHere" Grid.Row="1" />
</StackPanel>
Your Custom controls will also inherit the DataContext if your using data binding...my personal favorite benefit of this approach.
I had similar problem recently in two column grid, I needed a margin on elements in right column only. All elements in both columns were of type TextBlock.
<Grid.Resources>
<Style TargetType="{x:Type TextBlock}" BasedOn="{StaticResource OurLabelStyle}">
<Style.Triggers>
<Trigger Property="Grid.Column" Value="1">
<Setter Property="Margin" Value="20,0" />
</Trigger>
</Style.Triggers>
</Style>
</Grid.Resources>
One possibility would be to add fixed width rows and columns to act as the padding / margin you are looking for.
You might also consider that you are constrained by the size of your container, and that a grid will become as large as the containing element or its specified width and height. You could simply use columns and rows with no width or height set. That way they default to evenly breaking up the total space within the grid. Then it would just be a mater of centering your elements vertically and horizontally within you grid.
Another method might be to wrap all grid elements in a fixed with single row & column grid that has a fixed size and margin. That your grid contains fixed width / height boxes which contain your actual elements.
in uwp (Windows10FallCreatorsUpdate version and above)
<Grid RowSpacing="3" ColumnSpacing="3">
Though you can't add margin or padding to a Grid, you could use something like a Frame (or similar container), that you can apply it to.
That way (if you show or hide the control on a button click say), you won't need to add margin on every control that may interact with it.
Think of it as isolating the groups of controls into units, then applying style to those units.
As was stated before create a GridWithMargins class.
Here is my working code example
public class GridWithMargins : Grid
{
public Thickness RowMargin { get; set; } = new Thickness(10, 10, 10, 10);
protected override Size ArrangeOverride(Size arrangeSize)
{
var basesize = base.ArrangeOverride(arrangeSize);
foreach (UIElement child in InternalChildren)
{
var pos = GetPosition(child);
pos.X += RowMargin.Left;
pos.Y += RowMargin.Top;
var actual = child.RenderSize;
actual.Width -= (RowMargin.Left + RowMargin.Right);
actual.Height -= (RowMargin.Top + RowMargin.Bottom);
var rec = new Rect(pos, actual);
child.Arrange(rec);
}
return arrangeSize;
}
private Point GetPosition(Visual element)
{
var posTransForm = element.TransformToAncestor(this);
var areaTransForm = posTransForm.Transform(new Point(0, 0));
return areaTransForm;
}
}
Usage:
<Window x:Class="WpfApplication1.MainWindow"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008"
xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006"
xmlns:local="clr-namespace:WpfApplication1"
mc:Ignorable="d"
Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525">
<Grid>
<local:GridWithMargins ShowGridLines="True">
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition />
<RowDefinition />
<RowDefinition />
<RowDefinition />
<RowDefinition />
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition />
<ColumnDefinition />
<ColumnDefinition />
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<Rectangle Fill="Red" Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="0" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" VerticalAlignment="Stretch" />
<Rectangle Fill="Green" Grid.Row="1" Grid.Column="0" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" VerticalAlignment="Stretch" />
<Rectangle Fill="Blue" Grid.Row="1" Grid.Column="1" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" VerticalAlignment="Stretch" />
</local:GridWithMargins>
</Grid>
</Window>
Sometimes the simple method is the best. Just pad your strings with spaces. If it is only a few textboxes etc this is by far the simplest method.
You can also simply insert blank columns/rows with a fixed size. Extremely simple and you can easily change it.
I have a stackpanel in a grid row with the row height set to auto.
I add user controls at runtime and the height resizes fine, when removing the user controls the height does not reduce though. I have tried to clear the stackpanel children, remove them one by one and also implemented IDisposable in each user control but when the child count shows zero the height has not reduced.
Sample XAML below, any help would be welcomed please?
<Grid x:Name="TestGrid">
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition Height="Auto" />
<RowDefinition Height="Auto" />
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal">
<TextBlock Text="Test Header" Style="{StaticResource SubHeaderTextBlock}" />
</StackPanel>
<StackPanel x:Name="ChildItems" Grid.Row="1" />
</Grid>
Replace the StackPanel with a Grid. Grids stretch and retract better than StackPanels.
Instated of removing put Visibility to Collapsed
I have a ListView inside a Grid which in turn is inside an "overall ScrollViewer".
Users should be able to scroll across the entire page horizontally and then scroll vertically down several child list like elements. While I am able to scroll horizontally, placing the outer ScrollViewer around the page content breaks my ListViews
Here is a cut down version of my XAML setup:
<Grid Background="{ThemeResource ApplicationPageBackgroundThemeBrush}">
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition Height="140" />
<RowDefinition Height="Auto" />
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<TextBlock x:Uid="Title" Text="Title"/>
<ScrollViewer Grid.Row="1" ZoomMode="Disabled"
VerticalScrollBarVisibility="Hidden"
HorizontalScrollBarVisibility="Auto"
VerticalScrollMode="Disabled"
HorizontalScrollMode="Enabled">
<Grid>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition Width="380" />
<ColumnDefinition />
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<!--My List-->
<ListView x:Name="MyList" Grid.Column="0" />
<Grid x:Name="AppointmentDetailView" Grid.Column="1">
<!--Some other stuff-->
</Grid>
</Grid>
</ScrollViewer>
</Grid>
If I set a fixed height on any parent of the ListView or the ListView itself the scrolling works as expected but fixing the height is undesirable for screens of varying sizes. I tried binding to the ActualHeight of the ListViews parents but no luck.
It seems like the ScrollViewers children are not constrained to the height available even when the ScrollViewer.VerticalScrollMode is disabled. Seems rather odd to me, I would have expected the ScrollViewer's layout logic to be similar to Grid in the direction it has been disabled.
Any help with this is appreciated, Thank you!
I found a workaround that involves wrapping my ScrollViewer in a Grid and binding to the outer Grids ActualHeightProperty on the child element of the ScrollViewer. its a bit of a hack but does what I need it to and goes something like this
<Grid x:Name="ScrollViewerContainer" ...>
<ScrollViewer VerticalScrollMode="Disabled" ...>
<!--Page Content-->
<Grid Height="{Binding ActualHeight, ElementName=ScrollViewerContainer}" ...>
....
Personally I feel like the ScrollViewer should not allow its children to determine its Width/Height when the scroll mode is disabled in a particular direction as it breaks nested ScrollViewer's. It should revert back to the available space. But hey, I'm not Microsoft..
I have just started to experiment with gridsplitters and have stumbled across a very weird behaviour and I cannot seem to fix it. Apparently the others have similar issues (according to google), but there were no helpful comments.
I have a grid with 2 rows. On start up the bottom one has a Hight of 250. The top row takes the rest with *. When I resize the rows with the splitter the behaviour is as expected for the top row. But when I drag the splitter upwards and past the program window, the content of the bottom row will drop out of the window (=move downwards until it is gone). I'd expect that I cannot make each row larger than the parent container.
<Grid x:Name="grid_main" ScrollViewer.VerticalScrollBarVisibility="Disabled" >
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition Height="*"/>
<RowDefinition MinHeight="250" Height="250"/>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<GridSplitter x:Name="splitter"
ResizeDirection="Rows" Grid.Column="0" Grid.ColumnSpan="1" Grid.Row="0" Width="Auto"
Height="5" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" VerticalAlignment="Bottom" Margin="0" ResizeBehavior="BasedOnAlignment" />
<Grid Grid.Column="0" Grid.Row="0">
</Grid>
<Grid Grid.Column="0" Grid.Row="1">
</Grid>
</Grid>
This is my code. The content of both rows is again hosted in grids and has been removed for the sake of simplicity. Again: Resizing for the top row works fine. But the bottom row can be resized to infinity. It works as expected if I hard-code a MaxHeight. But that has to depend on the window size.
Try changing your second RowDefinition to the following:
<RowDefinition MinHeight="250" MaxHeight="{Binding ElementName=grid_main, Path=ActualHeight}" Height="250"/>
This will ensure that the row height will not exceed the window size.
Richard's solution didn't work for me (the ActualHeight of the grid expanded past the window size along with the row height).
Using Snoop, I found that the ActualHeight of an ancestor ContentPresenter wasn't increasing. Thus the following bottom row definition worked for me, although I was still seeing issues if I set MinHeight on either the top or bottom rows:
<RowDefinition Height="430"
MaxHeight="{Binding RelativeSource={RelativeSource FindAncestor, AncestorType={x:Type ContentPresenter}}, Path=ActualHeight}"/>
This problem only occurs because the second row has an absolute Height. If you actually want an absolute Height value try Richards's solution. Otherwise, just use a relative Height (e.g. 2*) on the second row as well.
Grigory Zhadko's answer is good to me.
I had a problem with this code
gridBase.RowDefinitions[1].Height = (GridLength)gridLengthConverter.ConvertFrom("1");
gridBase.RowDefinitions[3].Height = (GridLength)gridLengthConverter.ConvertFrom("1");
and I fixed it like this
gridBase.RowDefinitions[1].Height = new GridLength(0.1, GridUnitType.Star);
gridBase.RowDefinitions[3].Height = new GridLength(0.1, GridUnitType.Star);
and the grid converter works perfectly
I have a recursively defined user control that needs the following properties:
there are two columns
the first contains a single border around some text
the second column contains a stack of these same type of controls (the recursive part)
if the box in the first column is shorter than the total height of the stacked boxes in the second column, the box should expand to make both columns the same height.
If the total height of the second column is shorter than the box in the first column, then the last item in the second column's stack should expand so they are the same height.
so for example, it might look like this:
Ok, so far what I have done is create a horizontal stack panel where the first item is a dock-panel containing a border and text... the second column is a vertical stack panel bound to a sublist, creating the recursive user control... like this..
<StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal" Background="AliceBlue">
<local:TMRequirementView Requirement="{Binding Baseline}" />
<StackPanel Orientation="Vertical">
<ItemsControl ItemsSource="{Binding Requirements}">
<ItemsControl.ItemTemplate>
<DataTemplate>
<local:TMGridView Baseline="{Binding}" />
</DataTemplate>
</ItemsControl.ItemTemplate>
</ItemsControl>
</StackPanel>
Where the requirement looks like this:
<DockPanel>
<Border MinHeight="50"
BorderBrush="Black" BorderThickness="2">
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Description}"
TextWrapping="Wrap" Background="Transparent" Height="Auto" />
</Border>
</DockPanel>
Now this works great if the stacked column is taller, but it doesn't work if the first column is taller, and I get gaps. Any idea how to handle this mutual height dependency?
Update:
So by adding a border around the right columns stack panel, I was able to see that the stackpanel actually did receive the min-height changes. However, even though there was room to expand, the children of the stack panel didn't automatically update. If I fix the minheight of the stack panel before hand to something large, the children fill up. What I need to figure out is how to update the chidren's height based on changes to the stack panel's min-height.
I think the Grid in this layout does what you describe. I put it in a DockPanel so that you can see how it resizes. Try typing stuff into the text boxes and watch how it behaves:
<Page
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml">
<DockPanel>
<Grid DockPanel.Dock="Top">
<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
<ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
<Grid.RowDefinitions>
<RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
<RowDefinition Height="Auto"/>
<RowDefinition Height="*"/>
</Grid.RowDefinitions>
<TextBox AcceptsReturn="True" Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="0" Grid.RowSpan="3"></TextBox>
<TextBox AcceptsReturn="True" Grid.Row="0" Grid.Column="1"></TextBox>
<TextBox AcceptsReturn="True" Grid.Row="1" Grid.Column="1"></TextBox>
<TextBox AcceptsReturn="True" Grid.Row="2" Grid.Column="1"></TextBox>
</Grid>
<TextBlock/>
</DockPanel>
</Page>
All three rows of the Grid will have the height of a TextBox at a minimum (when you replace the TextBoxes with other elements, you'll need to set minimum heights to keep them from vanishing if they're empty). Since the third row is star-sized, it will size itself to all remaining vertical space left after the first two rows are arranged. So if there's a bunch of content in the first column, the third row in the second column gets taller.
Edit
Actually, there's no reason to even screw around with a Grid in this case: What you're describing is really the behavior of the DockPanel:
<DockPanel>
<DockPanel DockPanel.Dock="Top">
<DockPanel.Resources>
<Style TargetType="Label">
<Setter Property="DockPanel.Dock" Value="Top"/>
<Setter Property="Background" Value="Lavender"/>
<Setter Property="Margin" Value="1"/>
</Style>
</DockPanel.Resources>
<DockPanel LastChildFill="True">
<Label>Foo</Label>
</DockPanel>
<DockPanel LastChildFill="True">
<Label>Foo</Label>
<Label>Bar</Label>
<Label>Baz</Label>
<Label>Bat</Label>
</DockPanel>
</DockPanel>
<Label/>
</DockPanel>