Programming WPF, 2nd Edition

Resources and Styles

WPF's styling mechanism depends on the resource system to locate styles. As you already saw in Chapter 8, styles are defined in the Resources section of an element and can be referred to by name, as Example 12-21 shows.

Example 12-21. Referencing a Style resource

<Window x:Class="ResourcesExample.Window1" Title="Resources"
  xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
  xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml">

  <Window.Resources>
    <Style x:Key="myStyle">
      <Setter Property="Button.FontSize" Value="36" />
    </Style>
  </Window.Resources>
  <Grid>
    <Button Style="{StaticResource myStyle}">Hello</Button>
  </Grid>
</Window>

Further, it is also possible to define a style that is applied automatically to an element without the need for the explicit resource reference. This is useful if you want the style to be applied to all elements of a particular type without having to add resource references to every element. Example 12-22 shows a version of Example 12-21 modified to take advantage of this.

Example 12-22. Implicit use of a Style

<Window x:Class="ResourcesExample.StyleExplicitReference" Title="Resources"
  xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
  xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml">

  <Window.Resources>
    <Style TargetType="{x:Type Button}">
      <Setter Property="Button.FontSize" Value="36" />
    </Style>
  </Window.Resources>

   <Grid>
    <Button>Hello</Button>
  </Grid>
</Window>

Notice that the Button no longer has its Style ...