Windows Phone 8 - Application bar command binding MVVM

This is a short post in which i will explain how on Windows phone 8 to bind the application bar button or menu item, first this is only a fix for the BindableApplicationbar which supports windows phone 7 only, i just made it support windows 8 no features added or anything.
i have uploaded the dll file here so it can be accessible easily here is the link to download
http://sdrv.ms/RApUal

now that you got the link lets check how we gonna use it

you can refer to BinableApplicationbar 

or check out the code here that i actually used in my app and i already read it there ! 

1. Add a reference to the BindableApplicationBar library here is the link again http://sdrv.ms/RApUal
2. Add XML namespace declaration in your page's XAML:
   xmlns:bar="clr-namespace:BindableApplicationBar;assembly=BindableApplicationBar"
3. Set Bindable.ApplicationBar property on your page code as in the snippet below:
   <phone:PhoneApplicationPage>
       …
       <bar:Bindable.ApplicationBar>
           <bar:BindableApplicationBar>
           </bar:BindableApplicationBar>
       </bar:Bindable.ApplicationBar>
   
   
   </phone:PhoneApplicationPage>
4. Bind properties of the BindableApplicationBar to your view model. Available properties:
   • BackgroundColor
   • BindableOpacity
   • Buttons (also the default Content property – you can just put BindableApplicationBarButton XML elements inside of the BindableApplicationBar XML element).
     BindableApplicationBarButton properties:
     • Command
     • CommandParameter
     • IconUri
     • IsEnabled
     • Text (note that the control can only fit up to about 11 characters and will trim anything over that limit)
   • ButtonsSource (alternative to Buttons – allows to bind to a collection of view models in a similar fashion to ListBox.ItemsSource)
   • ButtonTemplate (used with ButtonsSource in a similar way ListBox.ItemTemplate is used with ListBox.ItemsSource)
   • ForegroundColor
   • IsMenuEnabled
   • IsMenuVisible
   • IsVisible
   • MenuItems (similar to Buttons, but for BindableApplicationBarMenuItem elements and needs to be specified explicitly as <BindableApplicationBar.MenuItems/>).
     BindableApplicationBarMenuItem properties:
     • Command
     • CommandParameter
     • IsEnabled
     • Text (note the text can fit about 28 digit glyph-wide characters and will trim anything over that limit)
   • MenuItemsSource
   • MenuItemTemplate
   • Mode
5. Note ApplicationBar limitations – the total number of buttons defined through either the regular ApplicationBar, BindableApplicationBar.Buttons or BindableApplicationBar.ButtonsSource can’t be higher than 4. MenuItems max out at 50. If you go over – you will get an InvalidOperationException with a message like “Too many items in list”.

Sample code

<bar:Bindable.ApplicationBar>

    <bar:BindableApplicationBar

        IsVisible="{Binding BarIsVisible}"

        IsMenuVisible="{Binding IsMenuVisible, Mode=TwoWay}"

        IsMenuEnabled="{Binding IsMenuEnabled}"

        ForegroundColor="{Binding ForegroundColor, Converter={StaticResource DoubleToColorConverter}}"

        BackgroundColor="{Binding BackgroundColor, Converter={StaticResource DoubleToColorConverter}}"

        BindableOpacity="{Binding Opacity}"

        Mode="{Binding Mode}"

        MenuItemsSource="{Binding MenuItems}"

        ButtonsSource="{Binding Buttons}">

        <!--<bar:BindableApplicationBar.MenuItemTemplate>

            <DataTemplate>

                <bar:BindableApplicationBarMenuItem

                    Text="{Binding Text}"

                    Command="{Binding Command}"

                    CommandParameter="{Binding CommandParameter}"/>

            </DataTemplate>

        </bar:BindableApplicationBar.MenuItemTemplate>-->

        <bar:BindableApplicationBarButton

            Text="{Binding IconButtonText}"

            IconUri="{Binding IconUri, FallbackValue=/Icons/Dark/appbar.add.rest.png}"

            IsEnabled="{Binding ButtonIsEnabled}" />

        <bar:BindableApplicationBarButton

            Text="XAML Btn 2"

            IconUri="/Icons/Dark/appbar.next.rest.png"

            Command="{Binding TestCommand}"

            CommandParameter="{Binding TestCommandParameter}" />

        <bar:BindableApplicationBar.MenuItems>

            <bar:BindableApplicationBarMenuItem

                Text="{Binding MenuItemText}"

                IsEnabled="{Binding MenuItemIsEnabled}" />

            <bar:BindableApplicationBarMenuItem

                Text="XAML MnuIt 2"

                Command="{Binding TestCommand2}"

                CommandParameter="{Binding TestCommand2Parameter}" />

        </bar:BindableApplicationBar.MenuItems>

    </bar:BindableApplicationBar>

</bar:Bindable.ApplicationBar>

I hope this was any near of a help to you, thanks for reading