#376 – Getting Text to Wrap in a Tooltip

When you specify the value of a tooltip by setting the Tooltip property for a control, a popup window for the tooltip is created and the window contains a single label.  By default, this label does not wrap, but displays in a single long line.

If you want the text in a tooltip to wrap, you can specify an explicit Tooltip control in XAML and set it up to contain a TextBlock.  The TextBlock has a TextWrapping property that lets you wrap the text.

        <TextBox Text="Now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this sun of York; And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house In the deep bosom of the ocean buried."
            Width="100" Margin="10">
            <TextBox.ToolTip>
                <ToolTip DataContext="{Binding Path=PlacementTarget, RelativeSource={x:Static RelativeSource.Self}}">
                    <TextBlock Text="{Binding Text}" TextWrapping="Wrap" Width="200"/>
                </ToolTip>
            </TextBox.ToolTip>
        </TextBox>

#374 – Using a Tooltip to Display the Full Contents of a TextBox

It might often be the case that a TextBox control is not wide enough to display all of its text (the current value of its Text property).

The user could click in the TextBox control and move the cursor in order to see all of the text, but it would be handy to display the full contents in a tooltip.

You can set up a tooltip to display the full text of the Text property by setting the Tooltip property of the TextBox and using data binding to bind its value to the Text property.

        <TextBox Text="Now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this sun of York; And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house In the deep bosom of the ocean buried."
            ToolTip="{Binding RelativeSource={RelativeSource Self}, Path=Text}"
            Width="100" Margin="10"/>

#373 – Creating More Complex Tooltips

You typically set a tooltip as a simple textual label, setting the value of the Tooltip property for a control to a text string.  You can also define a more complex tooltip that includes several controls.  In the example below, hovering over one of the tractor brands causes a tooltip to be displayed that shows the logo for the brand.

A tooltip is actually a popup window represented by an instance of the Tooltip control.  Because it inherits from ContentControl, its content can be any .NET object.

You can specify a tooltip’s content in XAML as a child element of the parent control.  The content must be a single element, but can be a container that in turn contains other elements.

            <RadioButton Content="Deere"
                         VerticalAlignment="Center" Margin="5">
                <RadioButton.ToolTip>
                    <StackPanel>
                        <Label Content="John Deere" FontWeight="Bold"/>
                        <Image Source="Deere.jpg"/>
                        <Label Content="Nothing runs like a Deere"/>
                    </StackPanel>
                </RadioButton.ToolTip>
            </RadioButton>
/RadioButton>