Question

I am trying to bind several different properties in my Xaml:

<Label Content="{Binding Description}" 
Visibility="{Binding Path=DescriptionVisibility, 
ElementName=_UserInputOutput}"               
FontSize="{Binding Path=FontSizeValue, ElementName=_UserInputOutput}"  
HorizontalAlignment="Left" VerticalAlignment="Top" Padding="0" />

You will noticed I have used two Different binding techniques here. The ones using Element Name work, the other does not. Here is code behind:

public string Description
{
     get { return (string)GetValue(DescriptionProperty); }
     set { SetValue(DescriptionProperty, value); }
}
public static readonly DependencyProperty DescriptionProperty = 
DependencyProperty.Register("Description", typeof(string), typeof(UserControl), 
new UIPropertyMetadata(""));

Each Binding has a different name but they all look like this for the most part.
I want my Binding to be able to work with:

{Binding Description}

Instead of:

{Binding Path=Description, ElementName=_UserInputOutput}

It only seems to be working when ElementName is used. I need to export/import this XAML, so I can’t have a ElementName or the import won’t work.

I thought this would be best:

{Binding Path=Description, RelativeSource={RelativeSource Self}}

This did not work.

Any ideas?? Thank you!

Answer 1

You haven’t set the DataContext, which is what the RelativeSource is using to determine what it’s relative to. You need to set the DataContext at a higher level, like the UserControl. I typically have:

<UserControl ... DataContext="{Binding RelativeSource={RelativeSource Self}}">
</UserControl>

This tells the UserControl to bind itself the class in the codebehind.