Walkthrough: Hosting a Windows Forms Control in Windows Presentation Foundation by Using XAML

WPF provides many controls with a rich feature set. However, you may sometimes want to use Windows Forms controls on your WPF pages. For example, you may have a substantial investment in existing Windows Forms controls, or you may have a Windows Forms control that provides unique functionality.

This walkthrough shows you how to host a Windows Forms System.Windows.Forms.MaskedTextBox control on a WPF page by using XAML.

For a complete code listing of the tasks shown in this walkthrough, see Hosting a Windows Forms Control in Windows Presentation Foundation by Using XAML Sample.

Note:
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Prerequisites

To complete this walkthrough you will need:

• Development Tools for .NET Framework 3.0, which enable you to create a WPF application project. For information on installing these tools, see Installation Instructions for the Windows SDK.

Hosting the Windows Forms Control

To host the MaskedTextBox control

1. Create a Windows Application (WPF) project named HostingWfInWpf.

2. In Solution Explorer, add a reference to the WindowsFormsIntegration assembly, which is named WindowsFormsIntegration.dll.

   The default location for this file is %programfiles%\Reference Assemblies\Microsoft\Framework\v3.0\WindowsFormsIntegration.dll.

3. In Solution Explorer, add a reference to the Windows Forms assembly, which is named System.Windows.Forms.dll.

4. In the Windows Forms Designer, open Window1.xaml.

5. Replace the code in Window1.xaml with the code in the following example.

   The wf namespace mapping establishes a reference to the DLL that contains the Windows Forms control. The MaskedTextBox control is created as a child of the WindowsFormsHost control.

   <Window x:Class="HostingWfInWpf.Window1"
       xmlns="https://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
       xmlns:x="https://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
       xmlns:wf="clr-namespace:System.Windows.Forms;assembly=System.Windows.Forms"  
       Title="HostingWfInWpf"
       >
   
       <Grid>
   
           <WindowsFormsHost>
               <wf:MaskedTextBox x:Name="mtbDate" Mask="00/00/0000"/>
           </WindowsFormsHost>
   
       </Grid>
   
   
   </Window>
   

   <Window x:Class="Window1"
       xmlns="https://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
       xmlns:x="https://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
       xmlns:wf="clr-namespace:System.Windows.Forms;assembly=System.Windows.Forms"  
       Title="HostingWfInWpf"
       >
   
     <Grid>
   
       <WindowsFormsHost>
         <wf:MaskedTextBox x:Name="mtbDate" Mask="00/00/0000"/>
       </WindowsFormsHost>
   
     </Grid>
   
   
   </Window>
   

See Also

Tasks

Walkthrough: Hosting a Windows Forms Control in Windows Presentation Foundation

Reference

ElementHost
WindowsFormsHost

Concepts

Walkthrough: Hosting a Windows Forms Composite Control in Windows Presentation Foundation
Walkthrough: Hosting a Windows Presentation Foundation Control in Windows Forms
Windows Forms Controls and Equivalent WPF Controls

Other Resources

Migration and Interoperability How-to Topics
Hosting a Windows Forms Control in Windows Presentation Foundation by Using XAML Sample