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Asked: 2026-05-14T04:36:01+00:00

I’m using MVVM in a WPF app. I’m very new to both. Let me

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I’m using MVVM in a WPF app. I’m very new to both. Let me state that I am not a purist in the MVVM pattern, I am trying to use as many best practices as I can but am trying to make what I think are reasonable compromises to make it work in our environment. For example, I am not trying to achieve 0% code in my View code-behind.

I have a couple of questions about best practices.

1) I understand I don’t want my VM to know about the attached View, but is it reasonable for the View to have a reference to its VM?

2) If a control in a View opens another View (such as a dialog) should I handle this in the View? It seems wrong to handle it in the VM since then the VM has some knowledge of a specific View.

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  1. Editorial Team

    1) The View has definitely a reference to the ViewModel through the DataContext. And you are allowed to cast the DataContext in your View:

    public class ShellView : Window 
{
   …
   public ShellViewModel { get { return DataContext as ShellViewModel; } }

    This isn’t a violation with the Model-View-ViewModel pattern.

    .

    2) You are right. A ViewModel shouldn’t open another View. A better approach is to use Controllers. They are responsible for the Workflow of an application.

    If you are interested in more detailed information then you might have a look at the WPF Application Framework (WAF).

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