docs-desktop/dotnet-desktop-guide/framework/wpf/data/how-to-bind-to-a-collection-and-display-information-based-on-selection.md

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title	description	ms.date	dev_langs	helpviewer_keywords	ms.assetid
How to: Bind to a Collection and Display Information Based on Selection	Follow this example to find out how to bind to a collection and display information based on selection in the Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF).	03/30/2017	csharp vb	data collections [WPF], selecting data for views data binding [WPF], creating views of data collections data binding [WPF], selecting data for views data binding [WPF], binding to collections	952a7d76-dd29-49e5-86f5-32c4530e70eb

How to: Bind to a Collection and Display Information Based on Selection

In a simple master-detail scenario, you have a data-bound xref:System.Windows.Controls.ItemsControl such as a xref:System.Windows.Controls.ListBox. Based on user selection, you display more information about the selected item. This example shows how to implement this scenario.

Example

In this example, People is an xref:System.Collections.ObjectModel.ObservableCollection%601 of Person classes. This Person class contains three properties: FirstName, LastName, and HomeTown, all of type string.

[!code-xamlCollectionBinding#Source]
[!code-xamlCollectionBinding#UI]

The xref:System.Windows.Controls.ContentControl uses the following xref:System.Windows.DataTemplate that defines how the information of a Person is presented:

[!code-xamlCollectionBinding#DetailTemplate]

The following is a screenshot of what the example produces. The xref:System.Windows.Controls.ContentControl shows the other properties of the person selected.

The two things to notice in this example are:

1. The xref:System.Windows.Controls.ListBox and the xref:System.Windows.Controls.ContentControl bind to the same source. The xref:System.Windows.Data.Binding.Path%2A properties of both bindings are not specified because both controls are binding to the entire collection object.

2. You must set the xref:System.Windows.Controls.Primitives.Selector.IsSynchronizedWithCurrentItem%2A property to true for this to work. Setting this property ensures that the selected item is always set as the xref:System.Windows.Controls.ItemCollection.CurrentItem%2A. Alternatively, if the xref:System.Windows.Controls.ListBox gets it data from a xref:System.Windows.Data.CollectionViewSource, it synchronizes selection and currency automatically.

Note that the Person class overrides the ToString method the following way. By default, the xref:System.Windows.Controls.ListBox calls ToString and displays a string representation of each object in the bound collection. That is why each Person appears as a first name in the xref:System.Windows.Controls.ListBox.

[!code-csharpCollectionBinding#ToString] [!code-vbCollectionBinding#ToString]

See also

• Use the Master-Detail Pattern with Hierarchical Data
• Use the Master-Detail Pattern with Hierarchical XML Data
• Data Binding Overview
• Data Templating Overview
• How-to Topics