ColumnDefinition position in the Grid

Question

I'm trying to figure out if a ColumnDefinition knows it's position inside the Grid or not.

I have 3 columns as follows:

<Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
  <ColumnDefinition Name="Left" Width="120" MouseEnter="Grid_MouseEnter" MouseLeave="Grid_MouseLeave"/>
  <ColumnDefinition/>
  <ColumnDefinition Width="120" MouseEnter="Grid_MouseEnter" MouseLeave="Grid_MouseLeave"/>
</Grid.ColumnDefinitions>

<view:Button Grid.Column="0" x:Name="GoLeft" Visibility="Hidden"/>
<view:MarkBox Grid.Column="1" x:Name="MarkBox1"
              MinHeight="110" MinWidth="100" Width="100" Height="110"/>
<view:Button Grid.Column="2" x:Name="GoRight" Visibility="Hidden"/>

And I want to apply the same MouseEnter function on both, put perform different actions if it's for the left or right ColumnDefinition . Does ColumnDefinition have a property containing its number or position inside the Grid ?

Answer 1

Mouse events on GridColumn are not working for me.

But every UIElement child of the Grid can have a Mouse event handler. For example:

<Grid>
  <Grid.ColumnDefinitions>
    <ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
    <ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
    <ColumnDefinition Width="*"/>
  </Grid.ColumnDefinitions>

  <Border Grid.Column="0" Background="Red" MouseEnter="OnMouseEnter"/>

  <Grid Grid.Column="1" Background="Green" MouseEnter="OnMouseEnter"/>

  <Rectangle Grid.Column="2" Fill="Blue" MouseEnter="OnMouseEnter"/>
</Grid>

As you can see, I attached the same event handler for the MouseEnter event on different controls: a Border , a Grid , a Rectangle ... Every control has a position relative to the parent Grid ( Grid.Row , Grid.Column ), so in the event handler you can check the AttachedProperty of the sender :

private void OnMouseEnter(object sender, MouseEventArgs e)
{
    var element = sender as UIElement;

    var columnIndex = element.GetValue(Grid.ColumnProperty);

    // use columnIndex somehow...
}