Repeated content (sub-template) in AngularJS - html

Question

I have a template which contains (in part) exactly the same content repeated two or three times with minor changes to the bindings, eg:
<div class="xyz-state0" data-ng-hide="data.error || !data.states[0].name">
<div class="xyz-content">
<img data-ng-src="{{data.states[0].image}}" width="48" height="48">
<span>{{data.states[0].name}}</span>
</div>
</div>
<div class="xyz-state1" data-ng-hide="data.error || !data.states[1].name">
<div class="xyz-content">
<img data-ng-src="{{data.states[1].image}}" width="48" height="48">
<span>{{data.states[1].name}}</span>
</div>
</div>
How do I write this to avoid duplicating this HTML? This is specific to its parent view (it won't be used anywhere else) so creating a full-blown widget seems wrong.
Basically I want something similar to ngRepeat, but I can't use that for the following reasons:
I need a specific (and different) style on each parent div.
I need to render a specific number of divs (2 in this case, 3 in another) regardless of whether or not they exist in the scope (ie. data.states could only have 1 element in it, but it still needs to create both divs).
In the other case the items need to be rendered out of order (first 1, then 0, then 2).
I've managed to get a template fragment in a separate HTML file and included it with ngInclude, but I don't know how to get a single name in its new scope to refer to a specific item. My first attempt was this, which doesn't work:
<div class="xyz-state0" data-ng-include="'state.tpl.html'" data-ng-init="state=data.state[0]"></div>
<div class="xyz-state1" data-ng-include="'state.tpl.html'" data-ng-init="state=data.state[1]"></div>
I suspect I could probably do it with a custom controller, but that seems like a heavy solution too. What's the Right Way™?

Answer 1

This is pretty much a textbook case for a custom directive. Define a directive, and then you can do
<state ng-repeat="item in data.states" item="item">.
Alternatively, if a custom directive is too much overkill (depends on whether you'll be reusing that view component elsewhere, mainly), you could just put an ng-repeat on the entire div. The only real issue is the class="xyz-stateN" stuff, but I bet you could hoke that up with ng-class usage.
EDIT:
if you do an ng-repeat, you can just use the $index key (as long as you're always counting up from zero and the state class is the same as the index). Something like
<div ng-class="{{'xyz-state'+$index}}" ng-repeat="state in data.states" data-ng-hide="data.error || !state.name">
<div class="xyz-content">
<img data-ng-src="{{state.image}}" width="48" height="48">
<span>{{state.name}}</span>
</div>
</div>
Would probably work fine. All that said, it's almost always worth making a directive in my opinion. Code gets recycled all the time, plus you can be cautious with namespacing and modularizing if that makes you nervous.

Answer 2

Well, this seems to do the trick (thanks to pfooti for the hint). I'm still not entirely happy with it as the directive is registered globally, whereas I really only want it in this one place.
state.tpl.html:
<div class="xyz-content" data-ng-show="state.name">
<img data-ng-src="{{state.image}}" width="48" height="48" />
<span>{{state.name}}</span>
</div>
view.tpl.html:
<div data-xyz-state="data.states[0]" class="xyz-state0"
data-ng-hide="data.error"></div>
<div data-xyz-state="data.states[1]" class="xyz-state1"
data-ng-hide="data.error"></div>
app.js:
app.directive('xyzState', [function() {
return {
templateUrl: 'state.tpl.html',
scope: {
state: '=xyzState',
},
};
}]);
Interestingly it doesn't work if I try to declare the introducing element as <xyz-state ...> instead of <div data-xyz-state="" ...>, despite the docs saying that this ought to work too. I assume there's some sort of validation thing interfering here.

Answer 3

Just as an FYI, I later revisited this code and decided to do it like this instead: (I'm letting my original answer stand as that is more like what I was originally asking for, and they both seem reasonable in different cases.)
view.tpl.html
<div data-ng-repeat="state in data.states" data-ng-if="!data.error"
data-ng-class="state.class">
<div class="xyz-content" data-ng-show="state.name">
<img data-ng-src="{{state.image}}" width="48" height="48" />
<span>{{state.name}}</span>
</div>
</div>
app.js
...
while ($scope.data.states.length < 2)
$scope.data.states.push({});
$scope.data.states[0].class = 'xyz-state1';
$scope.data.states[1].class = 'xyz-state2';
...
I've done something similar for the other (3-item) case, except there as I wanted to rearrange the order of the items I added an order property for the desired order in the controller and then used data-ng-repeat="button in data.buttons|orderBy:'order'" in the view.
This does mean that a bit of view definitions (display order and CSS classes) have leaked into the controller, but I think the benefit to code clarity outweighs that.