Recursion in Angular directives

Question

There are a couple of popular recursive angular directive Q&A\'s out there, which all come down to one of the following solutions:

• manually incrementally \

Answer 1

Manually adding elements and compiling them is definitely a perfect approach. If you use ng-repeat then you will not have to manually remove elements.

Demo: http://jsfiddle.net/KNM4q/113/

.directive('tree', function ($compile) {
return {
    restrict: 'E',
    terminal: true,
    scope: { val: '=', parentData:'=' },
    link: function (scope, element, attrs) {
        var template = '<span>{{val.text}}</span>';
        template += '<button ng-click="deleteMe()" ng-show="val.text">delete</button>';

        if (angular.isArray(scope.val.items)) {
            template += '<ul class="indent"><li ng-repeat="item in val.items"><tree val="item" parent-data="val.items"></tree></li></ul>';
        }
        scope.deleteMe = function(index) {
            if(scope.parentData) {
                var itemIndex = scope.parentData.indexOf(scope.val);
                scope.parentData.splice(itemIndex,1);
            }
            scope.val = {};
        };
        var newElement = angular.element(template);
        $compile(newElement)(scope);
        element.replaceWith(newElement);
    }
}
});

Answer 2

Inspired by the solutions described in the thread mentioned by @dnc253, I abstracted the recursion functionality into a service.

module.factory('RecursionHelper', ['$compile', function($compile){
    return {
        /**
         * Manually compiles the element, fixing the recursion loop.
         * @param element
         * @param [link] A post-link function, or an object with function(s) registered via pre and post properties.
         * @returns An object containing the linking functions.
         */
        compile: function(element, link){
            // Normalize the link parameter
            if(angular.isFunction(link)){
                link = { post: link };
            }

            // Break the recursion loop by removing the contents
            var contents = element.contents().remove();
            var compiledContents;
            return {
                pre: (link && link.pre) ? link.pre : null,
                /**
                 * Compiles and re-adds the contents
                 */
                post: function(scope, element){
                    // Compile the contents
                    if(!compiledContents){
                        compiledContents = $compile(contents);
                    }
                    // Re-add the compiled contents to the element
                    compiledContents(scope, function(clone){
                        element.append(clone);
                    });

                    // Call the post-linking function, if any
                    if(link && link.post){
                        link.post.apply(null, arguments);
                    }
                }
            };
        }
    };
}]);

Which is used as follows:

module.directive("tree", ["RecursionHelper", function(RecursionHelper) {
    return {
        restrict: "E",
        scope: {family: '='},
        template: 
            '<p>{{ family.name }}</p>'+
            '<ul>' + 
                '<li ng-repeat="child in family.children">' + 
                    '<tree family="child"></tree>' +
                '</li>' +
            '</ul>',
        compile: function(element) {
            // Use the compile function from the RecursionHelper,
            // And return the linking function(s) which it returns
            return RecursionHelper.compile(element);
        }
    };
}]);

See this Plunker for a demo. I like this solution best because:

1. You don't need an special directive which makes your html less clean.
2. The recursion logic is abstracted away into the RecursionHelper service, so you keep your directives clean.

Update: As of Angular 1.5.x, no more tricks are required, but works only with template, not with templateUrl

Answer 3

You can use angular-recursion-injector for that: https://github.com/knyga/angular-recursion-injector

Allows you to do unlimited depth nesting with conditioning. Does recompilation only if needed and compiles only right elements. No magic in code.

<div class="node">
  <span>{{name}}</span>

  <node--recursion recursion-if="subNode" ng-model="subNode"></node--recursion>
</div>

One of the things that allows it to work faster and simpler then the other solutions is "--recursion" suffix.