bind a ComboBox in DataGrid to a List<string>

Question

I need to bind a ComboBox in my dataGrid to a List<string>

the List is below:

public static ObservableCollection<string> m_Category = 
    new ObservableCollection<string>()  { "Simulation", "Materials" };

here is my comboBox definition :

<DataGridTemplateColumn.CellEditingTemplate>
    <DataTemplate>
        <Grid FocusManager.FocusedElement="{Binding ElementName= taskCombo}" >
            <ComboBox x:Name="MyComboBox" Height="Auto" Width="Auto"  
            ItemsSource="{Binding m_Category ,
                         NotifyOnTargetUpdated=True,
                         Mode=TwoWay,
                         UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged}" 
            SelectedIndex ="0"  
            SelectionChanged ="MyComboBox_SelectionChanged"/>
        </Grid>
    </DataTemplate>
</DataGridTemplateColumn.CellEditingTemplate>

i did not get any values in the combobox

Answer 1

Try this

 <ComboBox ItemsSource="{Binding Source={x:Static Member=local:MyWindow.M_Category}}"/>

 public partial class MyWindow : MyBaseWindow
{
    public static ObservableCollection<string> m_Category = new ObservableCollection<string>() { "Simulation", "Materials" };
    public static ObservableCollection<string> M_Category
    {
        get { return m_Category; }
    }
    ......

I hope this will give you an idea how to bind static properties

Answer 2

the ObservableCollection is static, so you'd have to use another syntax:

ItemsSource="{Binding Source={x:Static YourClass.m_Category} ,
                     NotifyOnTargetUpdated=True,
                     Mode=TwoWay,
                     UpdateSourceTrigger=PropertyChanged}" 

But: this won't work either. You can only bind to properties, not to fields. So you have to create a property, which I would not define as static anyway. Change your VM like :

public static ObservableCollection<string> m_Category = new ObservableCollection<string>()  { "Simulation", "Materials" };
public ObservableCollection<string> Category
{
  get { return m_Category; }
}

and bind your ComboBox to this Property:

<DataGridTemplateColumn.CellEditingTemplate>
  <DataTemplate>
    <Grid FocusManager.FocusedElement="{Binding ElementName= taskCombo}" >
        <ComboBox x:Name="MyComboBox" Height="Auto" Width="Auto"  
        ItemsSource="{Binding Category}" 
        SelectedIndex ="0"  
        SelectionChanged ="MyComboBox_SelectionChanged"/>
    </Grid>
  </DataTemplate>
</DataGridTemplateColumn.CellEditingTemplate>

of course this will only work if you have set the correct DataContext, which you can watch with some wpf spy like snoop