Why isn’t ‘Edit Other Styles’ in an object’s context menu in Blend?

March 26th, 2009 / Charlie Robbins

So I recently read a good tutorial on how to style a ListBox in Blend and I finally found a feature that I have simply overlooked in Blend for over a year. That feature is, as the title of this post suggests “Edit Other Styles,” which exists in the ‘Object’ menu in Blend. I have been getting around this perceived limitation in this extremely convoluted way that I am very happy I will no longer have to do.

The point I would like to now pose to the Blend team is that why in the name of all that is logical isn’t that option in an object’s context menu? To illustrate the differences here, I’ve got two screenshots of the ‘Object’ menu and the context menu of a ListBox:

  1. The ‘Object’ menu in Blend

Blend Object Menu Screenshot

  1. Context Menu of a ListBox

Blend ListBox Context Menu Screenshot

It just doesn’t make any sense to me why “Edit Control Template” and “Edit Other Templates” are important enough to have in the context menu when “Edit Style” and “Edit Other Styles” isn’t. The trend that I am seeing more and more from custom controls (such as the AutoCompleteBox or DataGrid) is an increase in the number of Styles for template parts. So please, please, just add it to the context menu in Blend 3 RTM.


  • Posted by Charlie Robbins

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