RadDocking behaviour in VS Designer

[Scott]

Whenever I place a RadDocking control in my views (usually UserControl) in order to have RadSplitContainer, RadPane, etc that I can rearrange, tear off etc. I loose the ability to manipulate the view in the Design pane of the designer.  Everything looks fine, I can edit the Xaml to my heart's content, and when I run the application everything works great.

But Clicking anywhere in the Design half of the designer just highlights the rectangle of the entire RadDocking control.  This makes it impossible to click on any child controls.  The focus is normally synchronized between the Xaml and Design halves of the designer, so moving the caret in the Xaml moves the focus in the Design, and vise-versa.  But once a RadDocking is added as a containing control, all that stops working.

I can live without the abilitity to actually change the child controls directly in the Design view because I almost always just directly edit the Xaml.  But the loss of the ability to select and more so the synchronized highlight is really killing my productivity on complex views. Namely because when there are many nested controls and a LOT of Xaml I can't just "jump" to the correct markup by clicking the control, and conversely when I click on Xaml markup I can no longer see in Design exactly which control I'll be effecting with changes.

So is the problem I'm having with the RadDocking and designer interaction a deficiency in the control, the VS2013 designer, or something else?

[Georgi]

Hello Scott,

I have tried the described scenario using only TextBox and TextBlocks, but it seems like it behaves as you have described. When the user control is added in the MainWindow its elements cannot be accessed and only the user control is highlighted.

Also I have attached a video showing how it behaves on my machine. It would be great if you can check it out and let us know if this is the issue you are facing (as it seems it is not supported by the VisualStudio) or I am missing something.

In case this is not what you are experiencing  it would be great if you can attached a simple video showing it.

I'm looking forward to hearing from you.

Regards,
Georgi
Telerik

 

 

[Scott]

Georgi,
I'm quiet aware that any UserControl placed into anything doesn't allow you to manipulate it's sub controls.
I never said anything about a MainWindow. I said that if I use Rad Docking in a VIEW, often a UserControl in my case, I loose designer function.  To demonstrate the problem using a Window view, and a very minimal number of controls use this Xaml:

<Window x:Class="WpfApplication1.MainWindow"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        xmlns:telerik="http://schemas.telerik.com/2008/xaml/presentation"
        Title="MainWindow" Height="200" Width="270">

    <telerik:RadDocking>
        <telerik:RadSplitContainer InitialPosition="DockedTop" Width="100" Orientation="Horizontal">
            <telerik:RadPaneGroup>
                <telerik:RadPane Header="Options" CanUserClose="False"  IsPinned="False">
                    <StackPanel>
                        <TextBox Text="Textbox C" />
                        <TextBox Text="Textbox D" />
                        <Button Content="Set" />
                    </StackPanel>
                </telerik:RadPane>
            </telerik:RadPaneGroup>
        </telerik:RadSplitContainer>

        <telerik:RadDocking.DocumentHost>
            <StackPanel>
                <TextBox Text="Textbox A" />
                <TextBox Text="Textbox B" />
                <Button Content="Button" />
            </StackPanel>
        </telerik:RadDocking.DocumentHost>
    </telerik:RadDocking>
</Window>

Now try to click on a Textbox or Button ... you can't select it, the area of the docking control gets selected in the designer, and the "telerik:RadDocking" gets highlighted in the Xaml.  Worse, you can't click on Options to see its content, and drill down.

Here is the Xaml for the same window approximated using standard framework controls:

<Window x:Class="WpfApplication1.MainWindow2"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        Title="MainWindow" Height="200" Width="270">

    <StackPanel>
        <Expander Header="Options" Margin="5">
            <StackPanel>
                <TextBox Text="Textbox C" />
                <TextBox Text="Textbox D" />
                <Button Content="Set" />
            </StackPanel>
        </Expander>

        <StackPanel>
            <TextBox Text="Textbox A" />
            <TextBox Text="Textbox B" />
            <Button Content="Button" />
        </StackPanel>
    </StackPanel>
</Window>

If you click on these controls, they are properly slected in both the designer and the Xaml.  And you can click on the Options to expand it to see its content and further click on those controls to drill down.  This would work to any depth of contained controls.

The Telerik controls just don't function in the designer, making it a painful rocess to design complex views with them in it.

[Georgi]

Hello Scott,

I am sorry for the misunderstanding.

Please note, that we are continuously improving our design time functionality, however currently editing RadPanes that are unpinned (located in the AutohideArea) is not supported, but you can still set IsPinned = "True" and its content could be edited. Therefore we have logged a feedback item for improving RadDocking design time support and you can find it here in our portal.

Also it was not clear to me if you are not able to click the TextBox and the Button located in the "Options" RadPane or the ones located in the DocumentHost. So I have tested both scenarios and on my machine the ones located in the DocumentHost can be clicked in both scenarios - with RadDcoking and without it. You can check the attached video, where you can see how it behaves at my end.

So it would be helpful if you can verify if this is the case or you are not able to click (edit) all of the TextBoxes and Buttons. Also simple video would be very helpful.

Regards,
Georgi
Telerik