Two-way binding of Xml data to the WPF TreeView

Question

I am attempting to rewrite my ForestPad application utilizing WPF for the presentation layer. In WinForms, I am populating each node programmatically but I would like to take advantage of the databinding capabilities of WPF, if possible.

In general, what is the best way to two-way databind the WPF TreeView to an Xml document?

A generic solution is fine but for reference, the structure of the Xml document that I am trying to bind to looks like this:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<forestPad
    guid="6c9325de-dfbe-4878-9d91-1a9f1a7696b0"
    created="5/14/2004 1:05:10 AM"
    updated="5/14/2004 1:07:41 AM">
<forest 
    name="A forest node"
    guid="b441a196-7468-47c8-a010-7ff83429a37b"
    created="01/01/2003 1:00:00 AM"
    updated="5/14/2004 1:06:15 AM">
    <data>
    <![CDATA[A forest node
        This is the text of the forest node.]]>
    </data>
    <tree
        name="A tree node"
        guid="768eae66-e9df-4999-b950-01fa9be1a5cf"
        created="5/14/2004 1:05:38 AM"
        updated="5/14/2004 1:06:11 AM">
        <data>
        <![CDATA[A tree node
            This is the text of the tree node.]]>
        </data>
        <branch
            name="A branch node"
            guid="be4b0993-d4e4-4249-8aa5-fa9c940ae2be"
            created="5/14/2004 1:06:00 AM"
            updated="5/14/2004 1:06:24 AM">
            <data>
            <![CDATA[A branch node
                This is the text of the branch node.]]></data>
                <leaf
                name="A leaf node"
                guid="9c76ff4e-3ae2-450e-b1d2-232b687214aa"
                created="5/14/2004 1:06:26 AM"
                updated="5/14/2004 1:06:38 AM">
                <data>
                <![CDATA[A leaf node
                    This is the text of the leaf node.]]>
                </data>
            </leaf>
        </branch>
    </tree>
</forest>
</forestPad>

Answer 1

I know this is an old post, but there's a more elegant solution. You can indeed use a single HierarchicalDataTemplate, if you use an XPath expression that selects all of the nodes that you want the template to use: XPath=tree|branch|leaf.

<HierarchicalDataTemplate x:Key="forestTemplate"
        ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=tree|branch|leaf}">
    <TextBlock Text="{Binding XPath=data}" />
</HierarchicalDataTemplate>

Here's a full Page example with XData embedded in the XmlDataProvider1:

<Page 
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml">
  <Page.Resources>
    <XmlDataProvider x:Key="sampleForestPad" XPath="forestPad/forest">
        <x:XData>
            <forestPad xmlns=""
                guid="6c9325de-dfbe-4878-9d91-1a9f1a7696b0"
                created="5/14/2004 1:05:10 AM"
                updated="5/14/2004 1:07:41 AM">
                <forest 
                    name="A forest node"
                    guid="b441a196-7468-47c8-a010-7ff83429a37b"
                    created="01/01/2003 1:00:00 AM"
                    updated="5/14/2004 1:06:15 AM">
                    <data>
                    <![CDATA[A forest node
                        This is the text of the forest node.]]>
                    </data>
                    <tree
                        name="A tree node"
                        guid="768eae66-e9df-4999-b950-01fa9be1a5cf"
                        created="5/14/2004 1:05:38 AM"
                        updated="5/14/2004 1:06:11 AM">
                        <data>
                        <![CDATA[A tree node
                            This is the text of the tree node.]]>
                        </data>
                        <branch
                            name="A branch node"
                            guid="be4b0993-d4e4-4249-8aa5-fa9c940ae2be"
                            created="5/14/2004 1:06:00 AM"
                            updated="5/14/2004 1:06:24 AM">
                            <data>
                            <![CDATA[A branch node
                                This is the text of the branch node.]]></data>
                                <leaf
                                name="A leaf node"
                                guid="9c76ff4e-3ae2-450e-b1d2-232b687214aa"
                                created="5/14/2004 1:06:26 AM"
                                updated="5/14/2004 1:06:38 AM">
                                <data>
                                <![CDATA[A leaf node
                                    This is the text of the leaf node.]]>
                                </data>
                            </leaf>
                        </branch>
                    </tree>
                </forest>
            </forestPad>
        </x:XData>
    </XmlDataProvider>

    <HierarchicalDataTemplate x:Key="forestTemplate"
        ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=tree|branch|leaf}">
      <TextBlock Text="{Binding XPath=data}" />
    </HierarchicalDataTemplate>

    <Style TargetType="TreeViewItem">
      <Setter Property="IsExpanded" Value="True"/>
    </Style>
  </Page.Resources>

    <TreeView ItemsSource="{Binding Source={StaticResource sampleForestPad}}"
      ItemTemplate="{StaticResource forestTemplate}"/>
</Page>

This will render as:

Answer 2

Well, it would be easier if your element hierarchy was more like...

<node type="forest">
    <node type="tree">
        ...

...rather than your current schema.

As-is, you'll need 4 HierarchicalDataTemplates, one for each hierarchical element including the root, and one DataTemplate for leaf elements:

<Window.Resources>
    <HierarchicalDataTemplate
        DataType="forestPad"
        ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=forest}">
        <TextBlock
            Text="a forestpad" />
    </HierarchicalDataTemplate>
    <HierarchicalDataTemplate
        DataType="forest"
        ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=tree}">
        <TextBox
            Text="{Binding XPath=data}" />
    </HierarchicalDataTemplate>
    <HierarchicalDataTemplate
        DataType="tree"
        ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=branch}">
        <TextBox
            Text="{Binding XPath=data}" />
    </HierarchicalDataTemplate>
    <HierarchicalDataTemplate
        DataType="branch"
        ItemsSource="{Binding XPath=leaf}">
        <TextBox
            Text="{Binding XPath=data}" />
    </HierarchicalDataTemplate>
    <DataTemplate
        DataType="leaf">
        <TextBox
            Text="{Binding XPath=data}" />
    </DataTemplate>

    <XmlDataProvider
        x:Key="dataxml"
        XPath="forestPad" Source="D:\fp.xml">
    </XmlDataProvider>
</Window.Resources>

You can instead set the Source of the XmlDataProvider programmatically:

dp = this.FindResource( "dataxml" ) as XmlDataProvider;
dp.Source = new Uri( @"D:\fp.xml" );

Also, re-saving your edits is as easy as this:

dp.Document.Save( dp.Source.LocalPath );

The TreeView itself needs a Name and an ItemsSource bonded to the XmlDataProvider:

<TreeView
    Name="treeview"
    ItemsSource="{Binding Source={StaticResource dataxml}, XPath=.}">

I this example, I did TwoWay binding with TextBoxes on each node, but when it comes to editing just one node at a time in a separate, single TextBox or other control, you would be binding it to the currently selected item of the TreeView. You would also change the above TextBoxes to TextBlocks, as clicking in the TextBox does not actually select the corresponding TreeViewItem.

<TextBox
    DataContext="{Binding ElementName=treeview, Path=SelectedItem}"
    Text="{Binding XPath=data, UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged}"/>

The reason you must use two Bindings is that you cannot use Path and XPath together.

Edit:

Timothy Lee Russell asked about saving CDATA to the data elements. First, a little on InnerXml and InnerText.

Behind the scenes, XmlDataProvider is using an XmlDocument, with it's tree of XmlNodes. When a string such as "stuff" is assigned to the InnerXml property of an XmlNode, then those tags are really tags. No escaping is done when getting or setting InnerXml, and it is parsed as XML.

However, if it is instead assigned to the InnerText property, the angle brackets will be escaped with entities &lt; and &gt;. The reverse happens when the value is retreived. Entities (like &lt;) are resolved back into characters (like <).

Therefore, if the strings we store in the data elements contain XML, entities have been escaped, and we need to undo that simply by retrieving InnerText before adding a CDATA section as the node's child...

XmlDocument doc = dp.Document;

XmlNodeList nodes = doc.SelectNodes( "//data" );

foreach ( XmlNode node in nodes ) {
    string data = node.InnerText;
    node.InnerText = "";
    XmlCDataSection cdata = doc.CreateCDataSection( data );
    node.AppendChild( cdata );
}

doc.Save( dp.Source.LocalPath );

If the node already has a CDATA section and the value has not been changed in any way, then it still has a CDATA section and we essentially replace it with the same. However, through our binding, if we change the value of the data elements contents, it replaces the CDATA in favor of an escaped string. Then we have to fix them.

Answer 3

We had a similar issue. You may find reading this article helpful. We used the ViewModel pattern described and it simplified everything.