Question

In this Silverlight application, I am trying to access a resource from Application.Resources in a MainPage class. The resource has a x:Name attribute not a x:Key.

I know that I can assign a keyed resource from the Application.Resources by using the following line of code:

grid1.Background = (LinearGradientBrush)Application.Current.Resources["KeyedTwoColorGradient"];

Using this logic I tried to assign a named resource to my grid1.Background and used:

grid1.Background = ((LinearGradientBrush)Application.Current).Resources.NamedTwoColorGradient;

This line of code gives me an error:
Cannot convert type ‘System.Windows.Application’ to ‘System.Windows.Media.LinearGradientBrush’

I have tried also different lines but nothing has worked. I could not find the answer from somewhere else so I am here with this question.

In addition, could someone tell me when it would be appropriate to use Named resources and when it would be better to use Keyed?

Answer 1

For starters your brackets were in the wrong place in your example (you were actually casting an application object to a LinearBrush) e.g.:

 ((LinearGradientBrush)Application.Current)

but the “correct” syntax will auto-complete but will not compile:

(Application.Current as App).KeyedTwoColorGradient;

The problem is that there is no designer.cs equivalent for App.xaml, unlike user controls, so named members are only visible to intellisense but actually have no code-behind property.

You should use keys only for resources.