View/ViewModel Association - Convention and Configuration-based Approaches

Some time back, I blogged about different options to hook up a view to its view model when following the ViewModel (aka MVVM) pattern. There are multiple approaches in use out there. I raised the possibility of a convention-based approach in addition to existing ones like the ViewModelLocator pattern. Motivation: I find the simplest way to explain ViewModel is to present it as a better code-behind , especially to the mainstream developer who is intimately familiar with the latter (at least in the .net world). With the code-behind approach the UI, its state and operations are all mixed up. The ViewModel pattern is of course designed to help separate application logic from the view, but now results in two discrete halves that need to be reconnected...(read more) ...