Question

I have 3 textblocks in a stackpanel in a DataTemplate.

the idea is that the format should be like “a b c” with spaces between the textblocks but it may happen that textblocks “a” and “b” might be empty, so i end up with something like this ” c” ( two spaces before textblock c). How can i ensure that i have a margin but only if there is content?

Answer 1

If the TextBlock‘s Visibility is set to Collapsed, the Margin will not be shown. So I guess you can use a StringToVisibilityConverter to set its Visibility to Collapsed if the Text is empty.

Example

First you need to create a converter like this.

public class StringToVisibilityConverter : IValueConverter
{
    public object Convert(object value, Type targetType, object parameter, System.Globalization.CultureInfo culture)
    {
        if (value == null)
            return Visibility.Collapsed;

        if (value != null && string.IsNullOrWhiteSpace(value.ToString()))
            return Visibility.Collapsed;

        return Visibility.Visible;
    }

    public object ConvertBack(object value, Type targetType, object parameter, System.Globalization.CultureInfo culture)
    {
        throw new NotImplementedException();
    }
}

Then you need to include this converter into your xaml.

<converters:StringToVisibilityConverter x:Key="StringToVisibilityConverter " />

Finally, use it inside your TextBlock.

<TextBlock x:Name="MyTextBlock" Text="{Binding SomeText}"
         Visibility="{Binding SomeText, Converter={StaticResource StringToVisibilityConverter}}" />

For more info regarding how to use a converter, please take a look at this post.

Hope it helps. 🙂