How to make isTextSearchEnabled property work in case of ComboBox with icons in the beginning of text?

Question

In a ComboBox, we can jump to an item by typing its first few letters. This is when IsTextSearchEnabled property is set, which by default is true.

I have a custom ComboBox with images in the beginning, followed by a short text.

icon1 + Violet
icon2 + Red
icon3 + Blue

If I type "r", I expect to navigate to the Red item in the dropdown. However, because of an icon in the beginning, the IsTextSearchEnabled property does not behave as expected.

How can I make this work?

For example, in MyDropdown.cpp , I have

MyDropDownItem^ comboItem = ref new MyDropDownItem(icon, title);
sourceItems->Append(comboItem);

sourceItems is the list of items that the ItemsSource of this control uses. Each combobox item has a different image(icon) and hence, image src cannot be statically defined in xaml template.

Answer 1

How to make isTextEnabled property work in case of ComboBox with icons in the beginning of text?

You could bind ComboBox ItemsSource with string collection then custom the item content like the following, when you typing text, it will match with ItemsSource .

<ComboBox
    x:Name="MyComboBox"
    Width="200"
    Header="Colors"
    IsEditable="True"
    Loaded="ComboBox_Loaded"     
    >
    <ComboBox.ItemTemplate>
        <DataTemplate>
            <StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal">
                <Image
                    Width="22"
                    Height="22"
                    Source="Assets/StoreLogo.png"
                    />
                <TextBlock
                    Margin="10"
                    Text="{Binding}"
                    TextAlignment="Center"
                    />
            </StackPanel>
        </DataTemplate>

    </ComboBox.ItemTemplate>
</ComboBox>

private void ComboBox_Loaded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
{
    MyComboBox.ItemsSource = new List<string>() { "Red", "Green", "Blue" };
}

Update

public class ImageConverter : IValueConverter
{
    public object Convert(object value, Type targetType, object parameter, string language)
    {
        string resaut = string.Empty;
        switch (value.ToString())
        {
            case "Blue":
                resaut = "ms-appx:///Assets/BlueImage.png";
                break;
            case "Green":
                resaut = "ms-appx:///Assets/GreenImage.png";
                break;
            case "Red":
                resaut = "ms-appx:///Assets/RedImage.png";
                break;
            default:
                break;
        }
        return resaut;
    }

    public object ConvertBack(object value, Type targetType, object parameter, string language)
    {
        throw new NotImplementedException();
    }
}

Usage

<ComboBox.ItemTemplate>
    <DataTemplate>
        <StackPanel Orientation="Horizontal">
            <Image
                Width="22"
                Height="22"
                Source="{Binding Converter={StaticResource ImageConverter}}"
                />
            <TextBlock
                Margin="10"
                Text="{Binding}"
                TextAlignment="Center"
                />
        </StackPanel>
    </DataTemplate>
</ComboBox.ItemTemplate>