How can I find WPF controls by name or type?

Question

I need to search a WPF control hierarchy for controls that match a given name or type. How can I do this?

Answer 1

I have a sequence function like this (which is completely general):

    public static IEnumerable SelectAllRecursively(this IEnumerable items, Func> func)
    {
        return (items ?? Enumerable.Empty()).SelectMany(o => new[] { o }.Concat(SelectAllRecursively(func(o), func)));
    }

Getting immediate children:

    public static IEnumerable FindChildren(this DependencyObject obj)
    {
        return Enumerable.Range(0, VisualTreeHelper.GetChildrenCount(obj))
            .Select(i => VisualTreeHelper.GetChild(obj, i));
    }

Finding all children down the hiararchical tree:

    public static IEnumerable FindAllChildren(this DependencyObject obj)
    {
        return obj.FindChildren().SelectAllRecursively(o => o.FindChildren());
    }

You can call this on the Window to get all controls.

After you have the collection, you can use LINQ (i.e. OfType, Where).