How to save the IsExpanded state in group headers of a listview

Question

I have quite a tricky problem:

I am using a ListView control with the ItemsSource set to a CollectionViewSource including a PropertyGroupDescription to group the Lis

Answer 1

The accepted answer is wrong as explained in the comments. I wrote the following behavior which achieves the desired functionality:

public class PersistGroupExpandedStateBehavior : Behavior
{
    #region Static Fields

    public static readonly DependencyProperty GroupNameProperty = DependencyProperty.Register(
        "GroupName", 
        typeof(object), 
        typeof(PersistGroupExpandedStateBehavior), 
        new PropertyMetadata(default(object)));

    private static readonly DependencyProperty ExpandedStateStoreProperty =
        DependencyProperty.RegisterAttached(
            "ExpandedStateStore", 
            typeof(IDictionary), 
            typeof(PersistGroupExpandedStateBehavior), 
            new PropertyMetadata(default(IDictionary)));

    #endregion

    #region Public Properties

    public object GroupName
    {
        get
        {
            return (object)this.GetValue(GroupNameProperty);
        }

        set
        {
            this.SetValue(GroupNameProperty, value);
        }
    }

    #endregion

    #region Methods

    protected override void OnAttached()
    {
        base.OnAttached();

        bool? expanded = this.GetExpandedState();

        if (expanded != null)
        {
            this.AssociatedObject.IsExpanded = expanded.Value;
        }

        this.AssociatedObject.Expanded += this.OnExpanded;
        this.AssociatedObject.Collapsed += this.OnCollapsed;
    }

    protected override void OnDetaching()
    {
        this.AssociatedObject.Expanded -= this.OnExpanded;
        this.AssociatedObject.Collapsed -= this.OnCollapsed;

        base.OnDetaching();
    }

    private ItemsControl FindItemsControl()
    {
        DependencyObject current = this.AssociatedObject;

        while (current != null && !(current is ItemsControl))
        {
            current = VisualTreeHelper.GetParent(current);
        }

        if (current == null)
        {
            return null;
        }

        return current as ItemsControl;
    }

    private bool? GetExpandedState()
    {
        var dict = this.GetExpandedStateStore();

        if (!dict.ContainsKey(this.GroupName))
        {
            return null;
        }

        return dict[this.GroupName];
    }

    private IDictionary GetExpandedStateStore()
    {
        ItemsControl itemsControl = this.FindItemsControl();

        if (itemsControl == null)
        {
            throw new Exception(
                "Behavior needs to be attached to an Expander that is contained inside an ItemsControl");
        }

        var dict = (IDictionary)itemsControl.GetValue(ExpandedStateStoreProperty);

        if (dict == null)
        {
            dict = new Dictionary();
            itemsControl.SetValue(ExpandedStateStoreProperty, dict);
        }

        return dict;
    }

    private void OnCollapsed(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
    {
        this.SetExpanded(false);
    }

    private void OnExpanded(object sender, RoutedEventArgs e)
    {
        this.SetExpanded(true);
    }

    private void SetExpanded(bool expanded)
    {
        var dict = this.GetExpandedStateStore();

        dict[this.GroupName] = expanded;
    }

    #endregion
}

It attaches a dictionary to the containing ItemsControl which saves the expanded state for every group item. This will be peristent, even if the items in the control changes.

Usage:

    
        
    
    ...