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C# WPF Child Windows inside Main Window

So iv looked around for a bit and found out that MDI is obselete for WPF, Basically what i am trying to do is show a specific page in a grid object on load, and once a menu item from my drop down menu is selected, the content of the grid will be changed to the content from a different page (this is depending on which menu item is selected).
To go into more detail (perhaps this will help) The area where the window will be shown will need to have the window with no borders, or titles, or buttons to minimize/close etc.. only showing the content of this window, it won't be resizeable but fixed, i have a menu of which as i said earlier, when a different menu item is clicked, the relevant window should be displayed in the fixed area. Additionally if any buttons or events inside this content that is displayed happen (i.e a button causes a different window to show for example) then the content in the fixed area should be replaced by this new window's content
This is the first time i have done something like this and from what i've read it sounds like this is something very tricky for a WPF application, I hope i can get some sort of insight or direction i should be going so that i can make this possible.
Thanks.

You can try for example ChildWindow from Extended WPF Toolkit Community Edition.
Edit #1:
But whenever i try to create a WindowContainer in the Xaml it has
problems with the namespace prefix with "xctk:WindowContainer" so
how do i create the appropriate namespace prefix to use it?
You have to add that namespace:
xmlns:xctk=http://schemas.xceed.com/wpf/xaml/toolkit
For example:
<Window x:Class="WpfApplication1.MainWindow"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
xmlns:xctk="http://schemas.xceed.com/wpf/xaml/toolkit"
Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525">
<Grid>
<xctk:WindowContainer>
<xctk:ChildWindow Height="100" Width="250" Left="10" Top="10">
<TextBlock Text="Hello World ..." />
</xctk:ChildWindow>
</xctk:WindowContainer>
</Grid>
</Window>
Edit #2:
You can of course change some properties (for example):
<xctk:ChildWindow
Height="100"
Width="250"
Left="10"
Top="10"
Name="chWindow"
CloseButtonVisibility="Hidden"
WindowStyle="None"
BorderThickness="0">
Edit #3:
Ok yeah, so with everything referenced it is giving me errors still..
Try it simple… Create Wpf Application, add Extended WPF Toolkit 2.4 NuGet package, in MainWindow.xaml add previous code and in MainWindow.xaml.cs add next code:
namespace WpfApplication1
{
/// <summary>
/// Interaction logic for MainWindow.xaml
/// </summary>
public partial class MainWindow : Window
{
public MainWindow()
{
InitializeComponent();
this.Loaded += MainWindow_Loaded;
}
void MainWindow_Loaded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
this.chWindow.Show();
}
}
}

WPF binding from code-behind to Grid

I am trying to view the coordinates of a mouse click on a WPF screen with no luck. I have a rudimentary grid layout with a Textblock that will display these coordinates. I have bound values from the xaml to a code-behind before but am not sure if this direction is possible. My xaml is as follows
<Window x:Class="MouseUpExample.MainWindow"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525"
Name="MyWindow">
<Grid>
<TextBlock Text="{Binding Path=GetMouseCoordinates}"/>
</Grid>
</Window>
and my code-behind is as follows
using System.Windows;
using System.Windows.Input;
using System.Windows.Shapes;
namespace MouseUpExample
{
public partial class MainWindow : Window
{
Point currentPoint = new Point();
public MainWindow()
{
InitializeComponent();
}
private string GetMouseCoordinates(object sender, System.Windows.Input.MouseButtonEventArgs e)
{
if (e.ButtonState == MouseButtonState.Pressed)
{
currentPoint = e.GetPosition(this);
return currentPoint.ToString();
}
return "error";
}
}
any help would be greatly appreciated, thank you.

You've got multiple problems here.
Problem #1 is that you can't bind to a method. It needs to be a property and preferably either a DependencyProperty or one that takes part in the INotifyPropertyChanged interface.
Problem #2 is that binding works with the DataContext by default, but you're not setting the DataContext of your TextBlock, either explicitly or implicitly.
Problem #3 is that this doesn't really make sense. Is GetMouseCoordinates an event handler for something? You probably would want to split out the event handler and the property.
I'd suggest that you go read up on DataBinding in WPF and then give it another shot.

To be able to bind you'd have to set the DataContext to a class that implements INotifyPropertyChanged and bind to its properties. As you don't have it defined I'd set that text directly in the view.
<Window x:Class="MouseUpExample.MainWindow"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525"
Name="MyWindow" MouseDown="MainWindow_OnMouseDown">
<Grid>
<TextBlock Name="MyTextBlock"/>
</Grid>
</Window>
And in the code behind:
private void MainWindow_OnMouseDown(object sender, MouseButtonEventArgs e)
{
MyTextBlock.Text = e.GetPosition(this).ToString();
}

UserControl Events are very slow

I have recently started to move my user controls in DLLs. These controls usually look something like this:
<UserControl x:Class="DialogBase.UserControl1"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006"
xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008"
mc:Ignorable="d"
DataContext="{Binding RelativeSource={RelativeSource Self}}">
<Grid>
<Button Content="OK" Click="OkButton_Click"/>
</Grid>
</UserControl>
I want to able to use every button in the control like in a standard control. For example when somebody uses the control above, he should be able to handle the click event in an own method like this:
<lib:UserControl1
OkButtonClick="MyCostomClickMethod"
/>
I usualy achieve this like this: (code-behind file of user control)
public static RoutedEvent OkButtonClickEvent = EventManager.RegisterRoutedEvent("OkButtonClick", RoutingStrategy.Bubble, typeof(RoutedEventHandler), typeof(UserControl1));
public event RoutedEventHandler OkButtonClick
{
add
{
AddHandler(OkButtonClickEvent, value);
}
remove
{
RemoveHandler(OkButtonClickEvent, value);
}
}
private void OkButton_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
RaiseEvent(new RoutedEventArgs(OkButtonClickEvent));
}
This works fine but very slow. The delay between a click and the resulting action can be up to a second. Can somebody tell me if there is a faster or in any way better way to do this?

I would create a Command in the class the you actually want the event. Then bind the Button Command to it. You can create your own Command or use something like a DelegateCommand

How to manipulate a window object from another class in WPF

I'm new in WPF and C#. I know a lot of VB.NET and I'm used to the way when I call a form object like textboxes, etc. I'm calling it from another form. Now, I'm using WPF, I'm confused. Because I have a Main Window. And I want to add and item to a listbox in the Main Window from a Class. In VB.Net , its just like this.
IN FORM2
Form1.Textbox.Text = "";
Wherein I can't do it in WPF. Can someone please Help me. Thanks!

WPF windows defined in XAML have their controls publicly accessible from other classes and forms, unless you specifically mark them with the x:FieldModifier attribute as private.
Therefore, if you make an instance of your main window accessible in another class, be it a Window or anything else, you'll be able to populate controls from within this second class.
A particular scenario is when you want to update the contents of a control in your main window from a child window that you have opened on top of it. Is such a case, you may set the child window's Owner property to the current, main window, in order to access it while the child is visible. For instance, let's say you have defined these two windows:
// MainWindow
<Window x:Class="TestApplication.MainWindow"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525">
<Grid>
<ListBox Name="mainListBox" Height="250" HorizontalAlignment="Stretch" VerticalAlignment="Top"/>
<Button Content="Open Another Window" HorizontalAlignment="Center" VerticalAlignment="Bottom" Margin="20" Click="OpenAnotherWindow_Click"/>
</Grid>
</Window>
and
// AnotherWindow
<Window x:Class="TestApplication.AnotherWindow"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
Title="AnotherWindow" Height="300" Width="300">
<Grid>
<Button Content="Add New Item to Main Window" HorizontalAlignment="Center" VerticalAlignment="Center" Click="AddNewItem_Click"/>
</Grid>
</Window>
each in its own XAML file.
In MainWindow's code behind, inside the button click handler, you show an instance of AnotherWindow as a dialog and set its Owner property to MainWindow's instance:
private void OpenAnotherWindow_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
AnotherWindow anotherWindow = new AnotherWindow();
anotherWindow.Owner = this;
anotherWindow.ShowDialog();
}
Now, you can access the MainWindow's instance from AnotherWindow's Owner property, in order to add a new item to the ListBox control defined on it, in the button click handler in AnotherWindow's code behind:
private void AddNewItem_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
MainWindow mainWindow = Owner as MainWindow;
mainWindow.mainListBox.Items.Add(new Random().Next(1000).ToString());
}
It simply adds a new random number to the ListBox, in order to show how the code accesses and modifies the control's data in MainWindow.

Pure WPF solution, but also may be easiest in your case, is using a Data Binding in WPF.
Every form's control is binded to some data on ModelView (pure MVVM approach) or to data (more or less like yuo can do it in WindowsForms). So the "only" thing you have to do is to read/write data binded to controls on UI of that form.
For example, you have TextBox on Windows and want to read a data from it.
This TextBox is binded to some string property of the class that is responsible for holding the data for the controls on that form (just an example, in real world could be 1000 other solutions, based on developer decisions). So what you need, is not to say: "window give textbox" and after read TextBox's content, but simply read binded string property.
Sure it's very simply description of a stuff. But just to give you a hint. Follow databinding link provided above to learn more about this stuff. Do not afraid of a lot of stuff there, it's after all is not a complicated idea and also pretty intuitive. To make that stuff to work in simply case you will not need to make huge efforts by me. The stuff becomes really complex when you end up into real world applications.

This will get all active windows:
foreach (Window item in Application.Current.Windows)
{
}

UserControl calling methods and using variables outside it's class

I have a UserControl that looks like this:
<UserControl x:Class="Test3.UserControl1"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml">
<Grid>
<Button Name="mybutton" Content="Button Content"/>
</Grid>
</UserControl>
And a main window that uses it like so:
<Window Name="window_main" x:Class="Test3.Window1"
xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
xmlns:local="clr-namespace:Test3">
<StackPanel>
<Label Name="mylabel" Content="Old Content"/>
<local:UserControl1/>
</StackPanel>
</Window>
What I want to happen, is for mybutton's click event handler to set the content of mylabel to "New Content". However, it appears that this is impossible. Is there in fact a way to do this?

I have chosen to answer this myself since my solution ended up being a bit more complete. I don't fully understand the "right" way to do this, but this is how I did it:
Window1 window_reference = (Window1)(Window1.GetWindow((Button)sender));
After this, the children (such as other xaml controls) of the main window can be seen at compile-time.
Additionally, a more direct way of doing this is to have a public member of the UserControl like so:
namespace UIDD_Test
{
public partial class UserControl1 : UserControl
{
public Window1 window_reference;
public UserControl1()
{
InitializeComponent();
}
}
}
Then whenever appropriate, you can set that member to reference whatever window you want. In my case I have a Window1 class which is derived from Window, so I can set that member of the UserControl1 class like so:
myusercontrol.window_reference = window_main;
Where I've set up the xaml like so:
<local:UserControl1 x:Name="myusercontrol"/>
And window_main is the Name of the main window (it's a Window1 class).

There are several solutions:
The quick and dirty: on mybutton's click event handler, find the parent Window using VisualTreeHelper, then do a ((Label) window.FindName("mylabel")).Content = "New Content".
The clean WPF way: create a new class, add a property object LabelContent and a property ICommand ChangeContentCommand, that will change LabelContent on execution. Set this class as the DataContext of the window, bind the Content of mylabel to LabelContent and the Command property of mybutton to ChangeContentCommand (the user control will inherit the data context).

The simplest way to do what you describe is to take advantage of event routing and just add a handler in the Window XAML:
<StackPanel ButtonBase.Click="Button_Click">
<Label Name="mylabel" Content="Old Content"/>
<local:UserControl1/>
</StackPanel>
and the handler method:
private void Button_Click(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
mylabel.Content = "New Content";
}
I suspect you probably have some more complications to this in your real application so you may need to do more to verify that the click is coming from the correct button by checking some properties on it.