WP7 Pivot Title Template DataContext Binding not working - templates

Question

I have a Pivot Title Template so that the Pivot page has a title and subtitle. I want to set both via code.
I build the XAML in Blend and without code binding, it does display so that part works.
However, my binding isn't working. It either won't build because the object doesn't have a DataContext, or the object doens't exist in current context or does build but won't display. When it doesn't display, I assume I'm binding to the wrong XAML object.Each object is named only so I could find the right object to bind to.
The containing class for the bound code of Title and Subtitle looks like:
public class PivotTitle
{
public string Title = "";
public string Subtitle = "";
}
My question is: how do I correctly bind the TitleTemplate so that the two TextBlocks' Text properties can be set in code?
Here is the XAML
<controls:Pivot.TitleTemplate >
<DataTemplate x:Name="PivotTitleTemplateDataTemplate" >
<StackPanel x:Name="MyPivotTitle" DataContext="{Binding}" >
<TextBlock x:Name="Title"
Text="{Binding Title}"
FontSize="20"
TextWrapping="Wrap"/>
<TextBlock x:Name="Subtitle"
Text="{Binding Subtitle}"
Foreground="Gray"
TextWrapping="Wrap"/>
</StackPanel>
</DataTemplate>
</controls:Pivot.TitleTemplate>
The title and subtitle are dependent on the page navigated from. The code behind looks like:
//defined at top of page class
public PivotTitle _PivotTitle = new PivotTitle();
protected override void OnNavigatedTo(System.Windows.Navigation.NavigationEventArgs e)
{
base.OnNavigatedTo(e);
string queryStringDeploymentName = "";
this.NavigationContext.QueryString.ContainsKey("DeploymentName"))
_PivotTitle.Title = SelectedDeployment.DeploymentName;
_PivotTitle.Subtitle = App.ViewModel.AppSettings.UpdatedText;
MyPivotTitle.DataContext = _PivotTitle;
}
This particular example won't build with this error: The name 'MyPivotTitle' does not exist in the current context. The binding on the Pivot page's Listbox is working correctly.
I believe my codebehind and overall XAML are correct. I think I'm DataContext binding incorrectly.
Thanks for any help.

Answer 1

In your example MyPivotTitle is an element within the DataTemplate, so cannot be accessed directly from your code, hence the error. If you need to access a control inside a template of an items control (such as Pivot or ListBox`) then you may find this article from WIndowsPhoneGeek.com useful.
However, it sounds like you might be able to do this without any "hacking". Is this title and subtitle just for a single pivot item, or will it be on all of them? What other data, if any are you binding on the pivot item(s)?