How to make control that is Hidden by default show up in the Visual Studio 2010 WPF designer?

Question

I have a control that has Hidden visibility because it is bound to a property in the View Model whose default value causes it to be hidden. I can access it through the XAML but I'd like it still shown in the designer.

Is there a clean way of doing this? For now, I'm manually editing the Visibility attribute to make it show up, but I'd rather not have to do that, in case I forget to change it back.

score 5 · Answer 1 · answered Mar 26 '12 at 18:16

You can bind to the boolean attached property DesignerProperties.IsInDesignMode, which is true only if you are inside the designer. Here is an example:

<Window x:Class="Visitest.MainWindow"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        xmlns:cm="clr-namespace:System.ComponentModel;assembly=PresentationFramework" 
        Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525">
    <Window.Resources>
        <BooleanToVisibilityConverter x:Key="conv"/>
    </Window.Resources>
    <Grid>
        <TextBox Margin="8" Background="Green" 
                 Visibility="{Binding (cm:DesignerProperties.IsInDesignMode), RelativeSource={RelativeSource Self}, Converter={StaticResource conv}}"/>           
    </Grid>
</Window>

I clarified my question a bit. The Visibility is already bound to an item in the View Model, whose default value causes it to be hidden. Maybe I could change the binding to what you have here in the constructor if I'm in Design Mode? — jglouie, Mar 26 '12 at 18:19

score 2 · Accepted Answer · answered Mar 26 '12 at 18:07

2

Not sure it is a lot cleaner but you should set it to Visible in the ctor (before the Initialize);

answered Mar 26 '12 at 18:07

paparazzo

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Care to explain down vote on a accepted answer two years old? – paparazzo Mar 14 '14 at 18:42
It's not me who down voted. But I can't understand how your answer could possibly help. I don't think the designer reads the code behind file at all? – Arek Feb 09 '16 at 08:59
@Arek Exactly designer does not read the code behind and it has the check mark. – paparazzo Feb 09 '16 at 09:14
okay, then how setting anything in the constructor would make hidden control visible in the designer? – Arek Feb 10 '16 at 10:46

score 1 · Answer 3 · edited May 23 '17 at 12:10

1

Have you seen Hide WPF elements in Visual Studio designer? It looks like other people solved the issue by creating a simple custom extension.

edited May 23 '17 at 12:10

Community

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answered Mar 26 '12 at 18:07

Yossarian21

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No, I have not seen that link before. I'll check it out, thanks. – jglouie Mar 26 '12 at 18:15

How to make control that is Hidden by default show up in the Visual Studio 2010 WPF designer?

3 Answers3

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