WPF DataGrid rows/columns/cells highlighting

Question

I'm implementing data diff in my project and now i have a need to display my results to user. (I'm inspecting two arrays of arbitrary data and finding mismatches in them, my results are something like : "Status : mismatch, Property : ... Index: ..." (some class)). So It's working pretty well by now,first I thought it will be easy to highlight results in DataGrid, but when i started to implement this i realized that I just can't imagine how to get this done...I need to highlight preset cells and rows...Does any common solution exist? P.S DataGrid is binding to some data (using views). I have no much experience in WPF, so don't want to reinvent the wheel, think something should exist (solution, open-source project, code samples).

Answer 1

Here is example of what you need.

1. I assume, that ChangeItem is class for storing one line. So in xaml you bind ChangeItem[] to ItemsSource property of your datagrid.

   class ChangeItem
   {
       public string Previous { get; set; }
       public string Current  { get; set; }
       public bool HasDiff { return this.Previous != this.Current; } 
   }
   

2. In Xaml add special style to your Resources

   <Style TargetType="{x:Type DataGridCell}">
       <Style.Triggers>
          <DataTrigger Binding="{Binding HasDiff}" Value="true">
             <Setter Property="Background" Value="Red"/>
          </DataTrigger>
       </Style.Triggers>
   </Style>
   

3. If you need to support editing and real-time background changes, depending on changes made. Then properly implement INotifyPropertyChanged in class ChangeItem.

4. If you need to have more than 2 states (HasError/NoErrors), then create new enum, representing states. For example:

   public enum LineState
   {
        Normal,
        SmallError,
        MegaError,
   }
   

   And replace public bool HasDiff { ... } property with something like public LineState State { ... }.

Hope this helps.