PowerShell WPF XAML GUI Sample Codes / PowerShell XAML Designer

This repository is being refocused around a PowerShell-only WPF/XAML GUI designer for Windows.

The goal is to make it possible to create and maintain PowerShell WPF screens even in environments where Visual Studio, Blend, paid IDE add-ons, or third-party GUI designers cannot be installed or used.

The original WPF sample scripts are kept as compatibility/reference samples. The main tool is now under XamlDesigner.

PowerShell XAML Designer

The designer follows a two-file model:

MyWindow.xaml   # UI / layout
MyWindow.ps1    # PowerShell control references, event registration, application logic

This is intentional. A standalone PowerShell XamlReader does not use the compiled C#/VB code-behind model that Visual Studio WPF projects use. Therefore the designer generates PowerShell event registration such as:

[System.Windows.Controls.Button]$Button1 = $Window.FindName('Button1')

$Button1.Add_Click({
    param($sender, $e)

    # Add logic here.
})

instead of depending on Click="Button1_Click" in XAML.

Current features

• PowerShell + WPF only; no Visual Studio and no third-party module required at runtime.
• New / Open / Save / Save As for paired .xaml and .ps1 files.
• Runtime-discovered toolbox for public, instantiable WPF visual element types.
• Toolbox search plus a beginner-oriented Common category with short control descriptions.
• Drag-and-drop, double-click, or an explicit Add selected control button for inserting controls.
• Drag and drop from the toolbox to Canvas/Grid/StackPanel/DockPanel/WrapPanel/UniformGrid layouts and supported empty single-child containers such as Border and GroupBox.
• Direct mouse movement for controls whose parent is a Canvas.
• Arrow-key Canvas movement (1 px, or 10 px with Shift) plus optional 10-pixel mouse snap-to-grid.
• XAML document Outline, including selection/editing of the root Window.
• Selection of controls on the preview surface.
• Undo/redo for designer-side changes restores XAML and generated PowerShell together, while text editors keep native text undo/redo.
• Reflection-based property browser and property editing, including Canvas/Grid/DockPanel attached properties.
• Reflection-based event browser.
• Double-click an event to generate PowerShell event code.
• Double-click a control on the designer to generate its typical/default event (Click, SelectionChanged, TextChanged, etc.).
• XAML source editing, XML formatting, and well-formedness validation with line/position reporting.
• Live WPF preview through System.Windows.Markup.XamlReader.
• Preview-time removal of Visual Studio/Blend build-time attributes such as x:Class, mc:Ignorable, and d:*.
• Preview-time removal of XAML event attributes that cannot be resolved by standalone PowerShell, while preserving the source document.
• Automatic synchronization of named XAML controls into a generated control-reference region in the paired .ps1 file.
• Generated event handlers are placed in a dedicated region before $Window.ShowDialog(), so handlers are registered before the UI runs.
• Existing user event code is not overwritten when control references are refreshed.
• Deleting controls archives their generated event handlers as comments instead of leaving broken references or silently discarding the code.
• Safe preview blocks risky loose-XAML constructs/custom CLR elements and prevents automatic external resource navigation.
• Save As warns before replacing an already-existing paired .ps1 file; paired saves use temporary files/rollback and UTF-8 BOM for Windows PowerShell 5.1/Japanese compatibility.

Start the designer

From a PowerShell prompt:

.\XamlDesigner\Start-XamlDesigner.ps1

If the current process is not STA, the launcher attempts to relaunch the same PowerShell executable in STA mode automatically. It does not bypass the machine's execution policy.

Explicit launch examples:

powershell.exe -NoProfile -STA -File .\XamlDesigner\Start-XamlDesigner.ps1
pwsh.exe -NoProfile -STA -File .\XamlDesigner\Start-XamlDesigner.ps1

For a Japanese beginner walkthrough, see XamlDesigner/GETTING_STARTED.ja.md. The requested 50 simulated persona reviews are recorded in XamlDesigner/REVIEW_50_PERSONAS.md.

Design direction

Visual Studio's XML editor provides features such as XML syntax checking, schema-aware validation, IntelliSense, snippets, and document outlining. The PowerShell XAML Designer aims to provide the most useful subset for standalone PowerShell/WPF work without requiring a Visual Studio project.

The visual designer intentionally uses a Canvas as the default root layout because absolute positioning makes drag/move behavior deterministic. Existing Grid, StackPanel, DockPanel, WrapPanel, and UniformGrid layouts can still be opened and previewed, and controls can be added to supported root layout containers. Direct coordinate dragging is currently limited to Canvas parents.

See XamlDesigner/README.md for architecture, workflow, limitations, and planned editor features.

Existing samples

The original files remain available at the repository root as WPF/PowerShell examples:

• WPF_CustomGraphicalInputBoxSample.*
• WPF_GraphicalDatePickerSample.*
• WPF_InkCanvas.ps1
• WPF_OCR_Sample.ps1
• WPF_SimpleWeatherFormSample/

They are useful as real-world XAML compatibility samples for the designer.

Microsoft references

• Visual Studio XML editor: https://learn.microsoft.com/visualstudio/xml-tools/xml-editor
• Editing XML files: https://learn.microsoft.com/visualstudio/xml-tools/how-to-edit-xml-files
• XML editor IntelliSense: https://learn.microsoft.com/visualstudio/xml-tools/xml-editor-intellisense-features
• WPF drag and drop: https://learn.microsoft.com/dotnet/desktop/wpf/advanced/drag-and-drop-overview
• WPF dependency properties: https://learn.microsoft.com/dotnet/desktop/wpf/properties/dependency-properties-overview