Question

I am trying to cause a Grid (and all the controls on it) to shake in my WP7 app. Seems the best way to offset the grid is using the Margin property, but there is no ThicknessAnimationUsingKeyFrames supported in WP7 so I can’t do it directly.

Instead, I have created a custom control:

using System;
using System.Net;
using System.Windows;
using System.Windows.Controls;

namespace MyNamespace
{
  // Grid which has an OriginOffset property that is tied to the margin,
  // and thus can be animated.

  public class OffsettableGrid : Grid
  {
    public OffsettableGrid()
    {
    }

    public static readonly DependencyProperty OriginOffsetProperty = 
        DependencyProperty.Register(
        "OriginOffset", typeof(Point), typeof(OffsettableGrid), null);

    public Point OriginOffset
    {
      get
      {
        return new Point(Margin.Left, Margin.Top);
      }
      set
      {
        Margin = new Thickness(value.X, value.Y,
          Margin.Right, Margin.Bottom);
      }
    }
  }
}

and then in xaml I declare a storyboard as follows:

<Storyboard x:Name="m_shakeStoryboard" 
            RepeatBehavior="5x" 
            AutoReverse="False" 
            SpeedRatio="5">

    <PointAnimationUsingKeyFrames 
        BeginTime="00:00:00"
        Storyboard.TargetName="m_chooseAnswerGrid"
        Storyboard.TargetProperty="(OffsettableGrid.OriginOffset)">

        <EasingPointKeyFrame KeyTime="00:00:00"    Value="0,0"/>
        <EasingPointKeyFrame KeyTime="00:00:00.2"  Value="-10,0"/>
        <EasingPointKeyFrame KeyTime="00:00:00.4"  Value="10,0"/>
        <EasingPointKeyFrame KeyTime="00:00:00.6"  Value="0,0"/>
    </PointAnimationUsingKeyFrames>

</Storyboard>

and then of course I declare my grid using .

But when I go to start the storyboard:

m_shakeStoryboard.Begin();

my OriginOffset property never gets invoked. I put a breakpoint at “Margin = new Thickness(value.X, value.Y,” but it never gets hit. What am I doing wrong?

In the editor, whenever I change OriginOffset, the margins change as well as expected.

Any help much appreciated!
Thanks

Answer 1

Your dependency property is not well defined. You should use SetValue and GetValue:

public Point OriginOffset
{
   get
   {
       return (Point)GetValue(OriginOffsetProperty);
   }
   set
   {
       SetValue(OriginOffsetProperty, value);
   }
}

Then add a callback to the PropertyMetadata of the dependency property, to set the margin:

public static readonly DependencyProperty OriginOffsetProperty = 
    DependencyProperty.Register(
        "OriginOffset", 
        typeof(Point), 
        typeof(OffsettableGrid), 
        new PropertyMetadata(new PropertyChangedCallback(OnOriginOffsetChanged)));