I'm struggling with knowing how to change the colors used when selecting an
item in a databound ListBox. If I have a listbox which uses a datatemplate
for items, I  don't know how to use triggers to change the foreground and
background color in the template (if it was a ListBoxItem, I would say
ListBoxitem.IsSelected, but it is a Person for example) based on the item
being selected.

The problem is that the default selection foreground and background color
don't work with my DataTemplate's Gradient colors...text gets hidden

You might try posting this to
microsoft.public.windows.developer.winfx.avalon, and/or the WPF group on
the MSDN Forums.

Robin S.

Hi,

Sorry for delayed reply.

This question is actually not easy as it looks like. As a workaround, we
could bind the Selected item to a different DataTemplate, Josh Smith has a
blog on this technique:

#Josh Smith on WPF : Specializing the Selected Item's DataTemplate
http://www.infusionblogs.com/blogs/jsmith/archive/2006/08/09/699.aspx

By the way, currently there's no dedicated managed newsgroups for WPF yet,
so posting here is ok for now.


Sincerely,
Walter Wang (waw***@online.microsoft.com, remove 'online.')
Microsoft Online Community Support

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Thanks Walter, this was exactly what I needed. The style using a
relativesource binding is something I couldn't really get a grasp on, this is
perfect (though not immediately intuitive).

For others who are intersted here is the datatemplate that solves this issue:
<DataTemplate x:Key="itemTemplate">
      <Grid>
        <Grid.Resources>
          <!-- This style is applied to the StackPanel which contains the
controls only
               displayed by the ListBox's selected item. -->
          <Style x:Key="selectedPanelStyle">
            <Style.Triggers>
              <DataTrigger
                Binding="{Binding
                          RelativeSource=
                          {
                             RelativeSource
                             Mode=FindAncestor,
                             AncestorType={x:Type ListBoxItem}
                          },
                          Path=IsSelected
                         }"
                Value="False">
                <Setter Property="StackPanel.Visibility" Value="Collapsed" />
              </DataTrigger>
            </Style.Triggers>
          </Style>
        </Grid.Resources>

        <Grid.RowDefinitions>
          <RowDefinition />
          <RowDefinition />
        </Grid.RowDefinitions>

        <!-- This is displayed whether the ListBoxItem is selected or not. -->
        <TextBlock Text="{Binding Path=Name}"/>

        <!-- This is only displayed when the ListBoxItem is selected. -->
        <StackPanel Grid.Row="1" Style="{StaticResource selectedPanelStyle}">
          <Button>Edit Item...</Button>
        </StackPanel>
      </Grid>
    </DataTemplate>

Note the: Binding="{Binding
                          RelativeSource=
                          {
                             RelativeSource
                             Mode=FindAncestor,
                             AncestorType={x:Type ListBoxItem}
                          },
                          Path=IsSelected
                         }"

That is what allows you to know whether or not the item is selected.

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