WPF visual state manager in Blend 2 sp1

Question

Can anyone explain to me how to get the visual state manager to work with a WPF application? It's just been added to the new wpftoolkit. I installed it as told, but even the sample doesn't show the VSM. In silverlight it work, but not in WPF. If installed the latest Blend 2 and updated with the SP1.

Answer 1

This might also help: http://blogs.msdn.com/expression/archive/2008/10/30/blend-2-sp1-wpf-toolkit-visual-state-manager-for-wpf.aspx

Answer 2

rudigrobler, you've got me thinking... There should be a registry key... So I've just opened Blend in Reflector and started searching...

I've found the location:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Expression\Blend

And added the key a DWORD with the name EnableVSM and gave it the value 1

Now it works!

Easiest way to enable is to create a new .Reg file and add the following:

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Expression\Blend]
"EnableVSM"=dword:00000001

Now run it and you're done.

Answer 3

Read these 2 articles on VSM in WPF:

• http://dotnet.org.za/rudi/archive/2008/10/29/silverlight-love-for-wpf.aspx
• http://windowsclient.net/wpf/wpf35/wpf-35sp1-toolkit-visual-state-manager-overview.aspx

Their is a registry setting that needs to be "turned on" for VSM in WPF support for blend... Read more here