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I've recently started doing some stuff in WPF and I came up with an idea to integrate maps into my application. I tried some stuff with Google Maps, but the capabilities aren't that great, so after a while I gave up on Google Maps in WPF.

A little while later I bumped into Bing Maps. This looked way more promising than Google Maps to use with WPF. I've started playing around with Bing's Maps and the capabilities are great!

However, when I tried to put a pushpin on the map it wasn't immediately clear to me how to add a infobox to the pushpin, when hovering over it. I have found some examples how to do so, but it required procedural code linked to the xaml. I was actually looking for a method without using procedural code.

Is it possible to add a infobox to a pushpin with just xaml? Or does anyone have a good alternative method on how to do so?

There is a tooltip property available though, but I wasn't actually looking for that. I was actually looking for Google Maps' pushpin kind of style (if it is available).

Kara
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doc92
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1 Answers1

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Assuming I understand correctly what you want, I believe the short answer is: Sorry, but it's not possible to add a Google-Maps-style info box to a pushpin with just XAML. However, I'll try to help if I can.

Disclaimer: I've been playing with the Bing Maps control for Silverlight, so hopefully this will be applicable to the WPF version of the control as well.

I imagine that you don't want to use the built-in ToolTip either because you want it to look different (i.e. not just a yellow box with text) or because you want it to not disappear when the user moves the mouse away.

If you just want it to look different, I can offer the following. When I specified a template for my Pushpins, I went ahead and used a re-templated ToolTip and allowed the user to click the pushpin to get more information.

Bing Map with custom ToolTip

Here's the ToolTip template, defined as a StaticResource, which of course could contain anything you want:

<Style x:Key="MyToolTipStyle" TargetType="ToolTip">
    <Setter Property="Template">
        <Setter.Value>
            <ControlTemplate>
                <Border CornerRadius="5" BorderBrush="Black" BorderThickness="2" Background="#5c87b2">
                    <ContentPresenter Margin="5">
                        <ContentPresenter.Content>
                            <StackPanel Margin="5" MaxWidth="400">
                                <TextBlock Text="{Binding Name}" FontWeight="Bold" FontSize="16" Foreground="White" TextWrapping="Wrap"/>
                                <TextBlock Text="{Binding Description}" Foreground="White" TextWrapping="Wrap"/>
                            </StackPanel>
                        </ContentPresenter.Content>
                    </ContentPresenter>
                </Border>
            </ControlTemplate>
        </Setter.Value>
    </Setter>
</Style>

And here's where I used it:

<maps:Map>
    <maps:MapItemsControl ItemsSource="{Binding SearchResultsManager.Items}">
        <maps:MapItemsControl.ItemTemplate>
            <DataTemplate>
                <maps:Pushpin Location="{Binding Location}" Cursor="Hand" MouseLeftButtonUp="Pushpin_MouseLeftButtonUp">
                    <ToolTipService.ToolTip>
                        <ToolTip Style="{StaticResource MyToolTipStyle}" />
                    </ToolTipService.ToolTip>
                </maps:Pushpin>
            </DataTemplate>
        </maps:MapItemsControl.ItemTemplate>
    </maps:MapItemsControl>
</maps:Map>

Then I'd handle when the user clicked on the pushpin to take them to a details area.

private void Pushpin_MouseLeftButtonUp(object sender, MouseButtonEventArgs e)
{
    // Get a reference to the object that was clicked.
    var clickedSearchResult = (sender as FrameworkElement).DataContext as SearchResultViewModel;

    // Do something with it.
}

However, I imagine you want to keep the ToolTip from disappearing, so that the user can click on controls inside it. Unfortunately, I'm not sure there's a simple way to do that. You might have to define your own custom control, which of course would require some C#/VB code.

Perhaps this new control could derive from Pushpin, and it could show the info box content on mouse-over and/or click. You could use the VisualStateManager to keep most of the code in XAML. The C#/VB would just have to provide a dependency property for the content and some overrides to transition between the visual states at the correct times.

I hope that's at least a little bit helpful!

Andrew
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    That explains a lot, thank you! I kept looking and trying all sorts of things to make that infobox in just WPF.. Hahah thanks for the info! You're method seems like the best way to go. Thank you! :) – doc92 Sep 27 '11 at 07:34