Refactor XAML in WPF

Question

My XAML has got very long and hard to maintain. I was wondering if there is a way to do something like refactoring?

Here is a simple example:

<Window x:Class="RefactorXAML.MainWindow"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525">
    <Grid>
        <StackPanel>
            <Button>New</Button>
            <Button>Open</Button>
        </StackPanel>
    </Grid>
</Window>

How can I refactor the Stackpanel section and write something like this?

<Window x:Class="RefactorXAML.MainWindow"
        xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
        xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
        Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525">
    <Grid>
        // Refactored Markup
    </Grid>
</Window>

Answer 1

You could put those buttons in a user control, to make it like this:

<Window …
        xmlns:my="clr-namespace:SomeNamespace">
    <Grid>
        <my:NewAndOpenButtons />
    </Grid>
</Window>

You could also replace the grid by an items control which already includes those buttons, but that way you would impose too many restrictions on the other content, so I wouldn’t do that.

So for the above, your user control would look something like this:

<UserControl x:Class="SomeNamespace.NewAndOpenButtons" …>
    <StackPanel>
        <Button>New</Button>
        <Button>Open</Button>
    </StackPanel>
</UserControl>

Answer 2

1) using content control

<Window.Resources>
    <ControlTemplate x:Key="Stackpanel" TargetType="ContentControl">
        <StackPanel>
            <Button>New</Button>
            <Button>Open</Button>
        </StackPanel>
    </ControlTemplate>
</Window.Resources>

<Grid>
    <ContentControl Template="{StaticResource Stackpanel}"></ContentControl>
</Grid>

2)create new usercontrol

<UserControl x:Class="WpfApplication2.UserControl1"
         xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
         xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
         xmlns:mc="http://schemas.openxmlformats.org/markup-compatibility/2006" 
         xmlns:d="http://schemas.microsoft.com/expression/blend/2008" 
         mc:Ignorable="d" 
         d:DesignHeight="300" d:DesignWidth="300">
<StackPanel>
    <Button>New</Button>
    <Button>Open</Button>
</StackPanel>

<Window x:Class="WpfApplication2.MainWindow"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml/presentation"
    xmlns:x="http://schemas.microsoft.com/winfx/2006/xaml"
    Title="MainWindow" Height="350" Width="525"
    xmlns:local="clr-namespace:WpfApplication2">

<Grid>
    <local:UserControl1></local:UserControl1>
</Grid>