Question

I’m using WPF and for example I have listbox of “professions” (Name, Holiday Date, Holiday Name, etc).

What I need to do is to edit and add profs.

1. This could be done with new window of Adding and Editing with editable textboxes and datepickers. Typical way.

2. Or I could create DataTemplateSelector my listbox and after user click “edit” change DefaultItemTemplate to EditingItemTemplate. In this way we have no need for new window.
   Here is the screenshot: http://i52.tinypic.com/303l6d4.png

What way will be better for users? I think I like the way #2. But doesn’t it look much complicated for users?

Thanks.

Answer 1

I’d say the second approach is mach better. Especially if editing is supposed to be a very typical operation for your application I’d suggest you implement switching to the editing mode by click on an one of those fields, also automatically change a content of focused field on user input, in other words implement a behavior similar to Excel’s cells. If the typical use case of this form is just browsing then its worth to consider adding a stylized button/link that switches current item to edit mode. Also probably its better to add such a button for each typical action (“Show clients”) right to the item template (to the right top corner for example). And display these buttons only if item is selected or mouse is over this item. Opening and selecting a desired usual action from the context menu is quite “stressful” experience 🙂