When my app starts I load some settings from a server. Most of my controllers need this before anything useful can be done. I want to simplify the controller\'s code as much
Somewhere you would need to "wait".
The only built-in way in Angular to completely absolve the controller from having to wait on its own for async data to be loaded is to instantiate a controller with $routeProvider
's route's resolve
property (or the alternative $stateProvider
of ui.router
). This will run controller only when all the promises are resolved, and the resolved data would be injected.
So, ng-route alternative - plunker:
$routeProvider.when("/", {
controller: "SomeCtrl",
templateUrl: "someTemplate.html",
resolve: {
settings: function(settingsSvc){
return settingsSvc.load(); // I renamed the loading function for clarity
}
});
Then, in SomeCtrl
you can add settings
as an injectable dependency:
.controller("SomeCtrl", function($scope, settings){
if (settings.foo) $scope.bar = "foo is on";
})
This will "wait" to load someTemplate
in <div ng-view></div>
until settings is resolved.
The settingsSvc
should cache the promise so that it won't need to redo the HTTP request. Note, that as mentioned in another answer, there is no need for $q.defer
when the API you are using (like $http
) already returns a promise:
.factory("settingsSvc", function($http){
var svc = {settings: {}};
var promise = $http.get('/api/public/settings/get').success(function(data){
svc.settings = data; // optionally set the settings data here
});
svc.load = function(){
return promise;
}
return svc;
});
Another approach, if you don't like the ngRoute
way, could be to have the settings
service broadcast on $rootScope
an event when settings were loaded, and controllers could react to it and do whatever. But that seems "heavier" than .then
.
I guess the third way - plunker - would be to have an app-level controller "enabling" the rest of the app only when all the dependencies have preloaded:
.controller("AppCtrl", function($q, settingsSvc, someOtherService){
$scope.loaded = false;
$q.all([settingsSvc.load, someOtherService.prefetch]).then(function(){
$scope.loaded = true;
});
});
And in the View, toggle ng-if
with loaded
:
<body ng-controller="AppCtrl">
<div ng-if="!loaded">loading app...</div>
<div ng-if="loaded">
<div ng-controller="MainCtrl"></div>
<div ng-controller="MenuCtrl"></div>
</div>
</body>
$http itself return promise you don't need to bind it inside the $q this is not a good practice and considered as Anti Pattern.
Use:-
app.factory('settings', ['$rootScope', '$http', '$q', function($rootScope, $http) {
return $http.get('/api/public/settings/get')
}]);
app.controller('SomeCtrl', ['settings',$scope, function(settings,$scope) {
settings.then(function(result){
$scope.settings=result.data;
});
}]);
Your way can be done as :-
app.factory('settings', ['$rootScope', '$http', '$q', function($rootScope, $http, $q) {
var deferred = $q.defer();
$http.get('/api/public/settings/get').success(function(data) {
deferred.resolve(data);
});
return deferred.promise;
}]);
app.controller('SomeCtrl', ['$scope', 'settings', function($scope, settings) {
settings.then(function(data){
$scope.settings=data;
})
}]);
Don't overload $rootScope if you wanted it you need to use $watch for the changes in $rootScope(Not recommended).
You can manually bootstrap your application after settings are loaded.
var initInjector = angular.injector(["ng"]);
var $http = initInjector.get("$http");
var $rootScope = initInjector.get("$rootScope");
$http.get('/api/public/settings/get').success(function(data) {
$rootScope.settings = data;
angular.element(document).ready(function () {
angular.bootstrap(document, ["app"]);
});
});
In this case your whole application will run only after the settings are loaded.
See Angular bootstrap documentation for details
Fo ui-router this is easily done with having an application root state with at least this minimum definition
$stateProvider
.state('app', {
abstract: true,
template: '<div ui-view></div>'
resolve: {
settings: function($http){
return $http.get('/api/public/settings/get')
.then(function(response) {return response.data});
}
}
})
After this you can make all application states inherit from this root state and
As mentioned above resolve also works for the original ng-route but since it does not support nesting the approach is not as useful as for ui-router.