How do I dynamically bind and statically add MenuItems?

Question

I'm binding the ItemsSource of my MenuItem to an ObservableCollection in my ViewModel. Here is my xaml:

<MenuItem Header="_View"
          ItemsSource="{Binding Windows}">
  <MenuItem.ItemContainerStyle>
    <Style>
      <Setter Property="MenuItem.Header"
              Value="{Binding Title}" />
    </Style>
  </MenuItem.ItemContainerStyle>
</MenuItem>

This part works great, but now I also want to add some static MenuItems to the same View MenuItem, separated with a separator. Something like this, even though I know this won't work because I can't set the items twice.

<MenuItem Header="_View"
          ItemsSource="{Binding Windows}">
  <MenuItem.ItemContainerStyle>
    <Style>
      <Setter Property="MenuItem.Header"
              Value="{Binding Title}" />
    </Style>
  </MenuItem.ItemContainerStyle>
  <Separator />
  <MenuItem Header="item 1" />
  <MenuItem Header="item 2" />
</MenuItem>

For now I have created a work around by adding another level to the MenuItem like this:

<MenuItem Header="_View">
  <MenuItem Header="Windows"
            ItemsSource="{Binding Windows}">
    <MenuItem.ItemContainerStyle>
      <Style>
        <Setter Property="MenuItem.Header"
                Value="{Binding Title}" />
      </Style>
    </MenuItem.ItemContainerStyle>
  </MenuItem>
  <MenuItem Header="Load Layout" />
  <MenuItem Header="Save Layout" />
</MenuItem>

This works fine, but I'd rather not have a sub menu if at all possible. Oh, and I'd also prefer to do this in xaml instead of code behind. Any ideas?

Justinjustina

Maybe you can use CompositeCollection to "unify" your collection from the VM with your XAML defined collection. – Rhnegative

Answer 1

You can use a CompositeCollection to do this, you can combine different Collections and add static items in the xaml.

Example:

Xaml:

<Window x:Class="WpfApplication8.MainWindow"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        Title="MainWindow" Height="233" Width="143" Name="UI">
    <Window.Resources>
        <CollectionViewSource Source="{Binding ElementName=UI, Path=Windows}" x:Key="YourMenuItems"/>
     </Window.Resources>

    <Grid DataContext="{Binding ElementName=UI}">
        <Menu Height="24" VerticalAlignment="Top">
            <MenuItem Header="_View" >
                <MenuItem Header="Windows">
                    <MenuItem.ItemsSource>
                        <CompositeCollection>
                            <CollectionContainer Collection="{Binding Source={StaticResource YourMenuItems}}" />
                            <MenuItem Header="Menu Item 1" />
                            <MenuItem Header="Menu Item 2" />
                            <MenuItem Header="Menu Item 3" />
                        </CompositeCollection>
                    </MenuItem.ItemsSource>
                    <MenuItem.ItemContainerStyle>
                        <Style>
                            <Setter Property="MenuItem.Header" Value="{Binding Title}"/>
                        </Style>
                    </MenuItem.ItemContainerStyle>
                </MenuItem>
            </MenuItem>
        </Menu>
    </Grid>
</Window>

Code

public partial class MainWindow : Window
{
    private ObservableCollection<MyObject> _windows = new ObservableCollection<MyObject>();

    public MainWindow()
    {
        InitializeComponent();
        Windows.Add(new MyObject { Title = "Collection Item 1" });
        Windows.Add(new MyObject { Title = "Collection Item 2" });
    }

    public ObservableCollection<MyObject> Windows
    {
        get { return _windows; }
        set { _windows = value; }
    }
}

public class MyObject
{
    public string Title { get; set; }
}

Result:

Teary

What is the {Binding ElementName=UI} stuff for? – Ancestry

what if I'm data binding Menu ItemsSource (not one of its MenuItems)? I couldn't get the ItemContainerStyle to work, because I set Menu.ItemContainerStyle and that's wrong... – Myelencephalon