MyAiConfiguration/shared/rules/wpf/references/resources-and-lifecycle.md

Resources and Styles

• Use shared resources for repeated styles, brushes, templates and dimensions.
• Keep resource dictionaries focused.
• Avoid giant global resource dictionaries.
• Prefer feature-level resources when styles are not truly global.
• Use StaticResource by default.
• Use DynamicResource only when runtime resource replacement is required.
• Avoid excessive dynamic resource lookups.
• Keep theme resources separated from application logic.
• Avoid hardcoded colors and dimensions when design tokens or resources already exist.

Windows and Dialogs

• Keep window lifecycle explicit.
• Avoid creating duplicate windows unintentionally.
• Do not keep hidden windows alive without a reason.
• Separate dialog logic from business logic.
• Prefer dialog services when ViewModels need to request user interaction.
• Keep ownership relationships explicit.
• Avoid application shutdown behavior that depends on accidental window lifetime.

Navigation

• Keep navigation state explicit.
• Avoid coupling ViewModels directly to concrete views.
• Avoid service locator patterns for view resolution.
• Keep navigation history intentional.
• Dispose or release navigation targets when they are no longer required.
• Do not retain entire navigation graphs unnecessarily.

Memory Management

• Watch for memory leaks caused by:

  • Event subscriptions
  • Timers
  • Static references
  • Long-lived services
  • Cached views
  • Closures
  • Collection views
  • Binding-related references

• Dispose resources correctly.

• Stop timers and background work when no longer needed.

• Avoid retaining closed windows or unloaded views.

• Do not keep unnecessary references to visual elements.

• Profile memory when long-running applications continuously grow.

Images and Media

• Load images at an appropriate resolution.
• Avoid decoding images significantly larger than their displayed size.
• Release streams and file handles correctly.
• Avoid locking image files unintentionally.
• Cache images only when there is a clear memory strategy.
• Avoid keeping large bitmaps alive unnecessarily.
• Prefer frozen image resources when they are immutable.