Question

I wrote a small attached property called “IsValid” for the WPF TextBox, like so:

public enum InputTypes
{
    Any,

    Integer,

    Double,

    Float
}

/// <summary>
/// This attached property can be used to validate input for <see cref="TextBox"/>. 
/// </summary>
public class IsValid : DependencyObject
{
    public static readonly DependencyProperty InputProperty = DependencyProperty.Register(
        "Input",
        typeof(InputTypes),
        typeof(IsValid),
        new UIPropertyMetadata(InputTypes.Any, onInput));

    public static InputTypes GetInput(DependencyObject d)
    {
        return (InputTypes)d.GetValue(InputProperty);
    }

    public static void SetInput(DependencyObject d, InputTypes value)
    {
        d.SetValue(InputProperty, value);
    }

    private static void onInput(DependencyObject d, DependencyPropertyChangedEventArgs e)
    {
        var textBox = (TextBox)d;
        var value = (InputTypes)e.NewValue;
        switch (value)
        {
            case InputTypes.Any:
                textBox.PreviewTextInput -= validateInput;
                textBox.PreviewKeyDown -= validateKeyDown;
                break;

            default:
                textBox.PreviewTextInput += validateInput;
                textBox.PreviewKeyDown += validateKeyDown;
                break;
        }
    }

    private static void validateInput(object sender, TextCompositionEventArgs e)
    {
        // enforce numeric input when configured ...
        var textBox = (TextBox) sender;
        var inputTypes = (InputTypes) textBox.GetValue(InputProperty);
        foreach (var c in e.Text)
        {
            switch (inputTypes)
            {
                case InputTypes.Integer:
                    if (!char.IsDigit(c))
                    {
                        e.Handled = true;
                        return;
                    }
                    break;

                case InputTypes.Double:
                case InputTypes.Float:
                    if (!char.IsNumber(c))
                    {
                        e.Handled = true;
                        return;
                    }
                    break;

                default:
                    throw new ArgumentOutOfRangeException();
            }
        }
    }

    private static void validateKeyDown(object sender, KeyEventArgs e)
    {
        // block [SPACE] when numeric input is expected ...
        var textBox = (TextBox)sender;
        var inputTypes = (InputTypes)textBox.GetValue(InputProperty);
        if (inputTypes != InputTypes.Any && e.Key == Key.Space)
            e.Handled = true;
    }
}

End here’s how I’ve used it:

<Window x:Class="Spike.Wpf.Controls.TestApp.MainWindow"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    xmlns:values="clr-namespace:Spike.Wpf.Controls.Input;assembly=Spike.Wpf.Controls"
    Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525">
<Grid>
    <TextBox values:IsValid.Input="Double" />
</Grid>

After the initialization (of the DependencyProperty) none of the methods in IsValid gets called however. What am I missing?

Answer 1

Earlier you probably got an error telling you that IsValid needs to derive from DependecyObject, so you added that, you should have asked yourself why that is. The answer is right here:

public static readonly DependencyProperty InputProperty = DependencyProperty.Register(...

You try to register a normal property for objects on type IsValid, change it to RegisterAttached and it should work. (I would also remove the inheritance and make IsValid a static class)