"Items collection must be empty before using ItemsSource."

Zack Peterson picture Zack Peterson · Mar 26, 2009 · Viewed 158.2k times · Source

I'm trying to get images to display in a WPF ListView styled like a WrapPanel as described in this old ATC Avalon Team article: How to Create a Custom View.

When I try to populate the ListView with a LINQ-to-Entities queried collection of ADO.NET Entity Framework objects I get the following exception:

Exception

Items collection must be empty before using ItemsSource.

My code…

Visual Basic

Private Sub Window1_Loaded(...) Handles MyBase.Loaded
    ListViewImages.ItemsSource = From g In db.Graphic _
                                 Order By g.DateAdded Ascending _
                                 Select g
End Sub

XAML

<ListView Name="ListViewImages"
          SelectionMode="Single"
          ItemsSource="{Binding}">
    <local:ImageView />
</ListView>

I put a breakpoint on that line. ListViewImages.ItemsSource is Nothing just before the LINQ assignment.

Answer

kenwarner picture kenwarner · Aug 7, 2009

I had this same error for a while in a slightly different scenario. I had

<wpftoolkit:DataGrid
    AutoGenerateColumns="False"
    ItemsSource="{Binding Path=Accounts}" >
    <wpftoolkit:DataGridTextColumn 
        Header="Account Name" 
        Binding="{Binding Path=AccountName}" />
</wpftoolkit:DataGrid>

which I fixed to be

<wpftoolkit:DataGrid
    AutoGenerateColumns="False"
    ItemsSource="{Binding Path=Accounts}" >
    <wpftoolkit:DataGrid.Columns>
        <wpftoolkit:DataGridTextColumn 
            Header="Account Name" 
            Binding="{Binding Path=AccountName}" />
    </wpftoolkit:DataGrid.Columns>
</wpftoolkit:DataGrid>