Question

I’m struggling with how to build this window in WPF.

The window has a Text Block whose contents are not known at design time. The Window should grow vertically to make the entire Text Block visible

I’ve tried a hierarchy similar to:

Window (auto height)
    Stack Panel (vertical orientation)
        Text Block
        Check Box
        Grid (for precise positioning of the buttons)
            Button 1
            Button 2

Is this a reasonable hierarchy? Is there a better way to build this?

Answer 1

What you are doing should work fine. You will want to make sure that you use the SizeToContent Property on your parent Window.
Something like this:

XAML

<Window x:Class="WpfApplication1.MainWindow"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        Title="MainWindow"  Width="525" SizeToContent="Height">
    <Grid Height="auto" >
        <StackPanel Orientation="Vertical" >
            <TextBlock Name="tb1" TextAlignment="Justify" TextWrapping="Wrap" Text="" />
            <Grid Height="30">
                <CheckBox VerticalAlignment="Center" Name="Random">Random CheckBox</CheckBox>
            </Grid>
            <Grid Height="auto">
                <Button Name="button1" HorizontalAlignment="Right" Margin="0,0,80,0" Width="70" Height="30" Click="button1_Click" />
                <Button Name="Button2" HorizontalAlignment="Right"  Width="70" Height="30" Click="Button2_Click" />
            </Grid>
        </StackPanel>
    </Grid>
</Window>

**CodeBehind”

private void button1_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
    {
        tb1.Text += "TextBlock with contentes set at run-time. " + 
                     "This text block should grow in height as necessary, " + 
                     "and push the other controls down.  The window itself " +
                     "should grow to \n\n Another paragraph\n";
    }