Question

I’m trying to apply the MVVM design pattern to a diagramming application. In this application there are different items (for example a rectangle, a circle,…). I would like to save the item type as an enum in my model.

In my modelview I made a class for every item type (rectangleViewMode, circleViewMode,…).

On my view I apply a data template to the type, so it renders like a circle, or like a rectangle.

The problem is…how can I convert the enum in my model to the requiered xxxViewMode? I have a lot of types and I would like an automatic conversion.

I’m new to MVVM and maybe there is a better approach…so better solutions are welcome! 🙂

Thank you very much

Answer 1

I read your question a little differently to the other answerers, i don’t believe you are just looking for a way to bind an enum to a combo, i think you are looking for a way to relate an enum value to an object type. If i got this wrong then stop reading now 🙂

First up: I’m not sure that saving the shape types as an enumeration (or even relating the shape to an enumeration) is very scalable. Read on, and i’ll explain towards the end.

To relate an item type to an enum, just have the item return the appropriate enum value via a property:

public CircleViewMode
{
    public ShapeType Shape { get { return ShapeType.Circle; }}
}

public enum ShapeType 
{
    Circle,
    Square,
    Rectangle,
    Triangle,
    FancyShape1,
    FancyShape2
}

This means that you don’t have to employ a converter or another translator mechanism. If you want to then populate a bunch of these into a combo then it is quite simple – check this following sample and insert breakpoints at the appropriate spot to see how it works.

namespace ConsoleApplication1
{
    class Program
    {
        static void Main(string[] args)
        {
            new Example().Run();

            Console.ReadKey();
        }
    }

    public class Example : INotifyPropertyChanged
    {
        public void Run()
        {
            var availableShapes = AllMyShapes.Where(x => x.NumberOfSides == 4);
            AvailableShapes = new List<KeyValuePair<string, Type>>
                (from Shape s in availableShapes
                 select new KeyValuePair<string, Type>(
                                                        Enum.GetName(typeof(ShapeType), s.ShapeType)
                                                       ,s.GetType()
                                                       ));

            //at this point any combobox you have bound to the AvailableShapes property will now carry a new list of shapes
        }

        public List<Shape> AllMyShapes
        {
            get
            {
                return new List<Shape>() {   new Circle(){NumberOfSides=1, ShapeType=ShapeType.Circle}
                                            ,new Square(){NumberOfSides=4, ShapeType=ShapeType.Square}
                                            ,new Rectangle(){NumberOfSides=4, ShapeType=ShapeType.Rectangle}
                                            ,new Triangle(){NumberOfSides=3, ShapeType=ShapeType.Triangle}
                                            ,new FancyShape1(){NumberOfSides=10, ShapeType=ShapeType.FancyShape1}
                                            ,new FancyShape2(){NumberOfSides=30, ShapeType=ShapeType.FancyShape2}
                                        };
            }
        }

        public List<KeyValuePair<string, Type>> AvailableShapes
        {
            get { return _availableShapes; }
            protected set 
            {
                _availableShapes = value;
            }
        }

        protected void NotifyPropertyChanged(string propertyName)
        {
            if (PropertyChanged != null)
                PropertyChanged(this, new PropertyChangedEventArgs(propertyName));
        }

        private List<KeyValuePair<string, Type>> _availableShapes;

        public event PropertyChangedEventHandler PropertyChanged;
    }


    public abstract class Shape
    {
        public int NumberOfSides { get; set; }
        public ShapeType ShapeType { get; set; }
    }

    public class Square : Shape { }
    public class Rectangle : Shape { }
    public class Triangle : Shape { }
    public class Circle : Shape { }
    public class FancyShape1 : Shape { }
    public class FancyShape2 : Shape { }

    public enum ShapeType
    {
        Circle,
        Square,
        Rectangle,
        Triangle,
        FancyShape1,
        FancyShape2
    }
}

With this approach you will have a combobox with nice human readable shape names in it, and you can instantly get the actual shape type of the selected item. It would be a trivial task to turn the class Example into an abstract base ViewModel, any ViewModel you then derive from it will have the AvailableShapes property.

But back to my original point of scalability – as you increase the shape types you also need to update the enumeration. This could be problematic if you ship libraries of new shapes or allow users to create their own. You may be better off saving it as myShape.GetType().ToString(), which returns a string value that can then be used to recreate the an instance of the object using reflection. In the above example of showing the items in a combo, you could just get a List<Type> of the available shapes and use a converter to produce a nice human readable name from the shape type (using a string resource file, eliminating the enumeration altogether).