How can I bind a background color in WPF/XAML?

Question

What do I have to change to the following code so that the background is red, neither of the 2 ways I tried worked:

_{(source: deviantsart.com)}

Answer 1

You assigned a string "Red". Your Background property should be of type Color:

using System.Windows;
using System.ComponentModel;

namespace TestBackground88238
{
    public partial class Window1 : Window, INotifyPropertyChanged
    {

        #region ViewModelProperty: Background
        private Color _background;
        public Color Background
        {
            get
            {
                return _background;
            }

            set
            {
                _background = value;
                OnPropertyChanged("Background");
            }
        }
        #endregion

        //...//
}

Then you can use the binding to the SolidColorBrush like this:

public Window1()
{
    InitializeComponent();
    DataContext = this;

    Background = Colors.Red;
    Message = "This is the title, the background should be " + Background.toString() + ".";

}

not 100% sure about the .toString() method on Color-Object. It might tell you it is a Color-Class, but you will figur this out ;)

Answer 2

You can still use "Background" as the property name, as long as you give your window a name and use this name on the "Source" of the Binding.

Answer 3

The Background property expects a Brush object, not a string. Change the type of the property to Brush and initialize it thus:

Background = new SolidColorBrush(Colors.Red);

Answer 4

The xaml code:

<Grid x:Name="Message2">
   <TextBlock Text="This one is manually orange."/>
</Grid>

The c# code:

protected override void OnNavigatedTo(NavigationEventArgs e)
    {
        CreateNewColorBrush();
    }

    private void CreateNewColorBrush()
    {

        SolidColorBrush my_brush = new SolidColorBrush(Color.FromArgb(255, 255, 215, 0));
        Message2.Background = my_brush;

    }

This one works in windows 8 store app. Try and see. Good luck !

Answer 5

I recommend reading the following blog post about debugging data binding: http://beacosta.com/blog/?p=52

And for this concrete issue: If you look at the compiler warnings, you will notice that you property has been hiding the Window.Background property (or Control or whatever class the property defines).

Answer 6

Important:

Make sure you're using System.Windows.Media.Brush and not System.Drawing.Brush

They're not compatible and you'll get binding errors.

The color enumeration you need to use is also different

System.Windows.Media.Colors.Aquamarine (class name is Colors) <--- use this one System.Drawing.Color.Aquamarine (class name is Color)

If in doubt use Snoop and inspect the element's background property to look for binding errors - or just look in your debug log.