I have an Angular SPA that presents a variety of recommendation lists, and a Google Map of locations, based on different cuts of some restaurant data (see m.amsterdamfoodie.nl). I want each of these lists to have their own URL. In order for Google to crawl the different lists I use <a>
tags for the offcanvas navigation.
At present the <a>
tag causes a view refresh, which is very noticeable with the map.
- I can prevent this using
ng-click
and $event.preventDefault()
(see code snippets below), but then I need to implement a means of updating the browser URL.
- But in trying Angular's
$state
or the browser's history.pushstate
, I end up triggering state changes and the view refresh...!
My question is therefore how can I update a model and the URL, but without refreshing the view? (See also Angular/UI-Router - How Can I Update The URL Without Refreshing Everything?)
I have experimented with a lot of approaches and currently have this html
<a href="criteria/price/1" class="btn btn-default" ng-click="main.action($event)">Budget</a>
In the controller:
this.action = ($event) ->
$event.preventDefault()
params = $event.target.href.match(/criteria\/(.*)\/(.*)$/)
# seems to cause a view refresh
# history.pushState({}, "page 2", "criteria/"+params[1]+"/"+params[2]);
# seems to cause a view refresh
# $state.transitionTo 'criteria', {criteria:params[1], q:params[2]}, {inherit:false}
updateModel(...)
And, what is I think is happening is that I am triggering the $stateProvider
code:
angular.module 'afmnewApp'
.config ($stateProvider) ->
$stateProvider
.state 'main',
url: '/'
templateUrl: 'app/main/main.html'
controller: 'MainCtrl'
controllerAs: 'main'
.state 'criteria',
url: '/criteria/:criteria/:q'
templateUrl: 'app/main/main.html'
controller: 'MainCtrl'
controllerAs: 'main'
One possible clue is that with the code below if I load e.g. http://afmnew.herokuapp.com/criteria/cuisine/italian then the view refreshes as you navigate, whereas if I load http://afmnew.herokuapp.com/ there are no refreshes, but no URL updates instead. I don't understand why that is happening at all.
Based on our previous discussions, I want to give you some idea, how to use UI-Router
here. I believe, I understand your challenge properly... There is a working example. If this not fully suites, please take it as some inspiration
DISCLAIMER: With a plunker, I was not able to achieve this: http://m.amsterdamfoodie.nl/, but the principle should be in that example similar
So, there is a state definition (we have only two states)
$stateProvider
.state('main', {
url: '/',
views: {
'@' : {
templateUrl: 'tpl.layout.html',
controller: 'MainCtrl',
},
'right@main' : { templateUrl: 'tpl.right.html',},
'map@main' : {
templateUrl: 'tpl.map.html',
controller: 'MapCtrl',
},
'list@main' : {
templateUrl: 'tpl.list.html',
controller: 'ListCtrl',
},
},
})
.state('main.criteria', {
url: '^/criteria/:criteria/:value',
views: {
'map' : {
templateUrl: 'tpl.map.html',
controller: 'MapCtrl',
},
'list' : {
templateUrl: 'tpl.list.html',
controller: 'ListCtrl',
},
},
})
}];
This would be our main tpl.layout.html
<div>
<section class="main">
<section class="map">
<div ui-view="map"></div>
</section>
<section class="list">
<div ui-view="list"></div>
</section>
</section>
<section class="right">
<div ui-view="right"></div>
</section>
</div>
As we can see, the main state does target these nested views of the main state: 'viewName@main', e.g. 'right@main'
Also the subview, main.criteria
does inject into layout views.
Its url starts with a sign ^ (url : '^/criteria/:criteria/:value'
), which allows to have /
slash for main and not doubled slash for child
And also there are controllers, they are here a bit naive, but they should show, that on the background could be real data load (based on criteria).
The most important stuff here is, that the PARENT MainCtrl
creates the $scope.Model = {}
. This property will be (thanks to inheritance) shared among parent and children. That's why this all will work:
app.controller('MainCtrl', function($scope)
{
$scope.Model = {};
$scope.Model.data = ['Rest1', 'Rest2', 'Rest3', 'Rest4', 'Rest5'];
$scope.Model.randOrd = function (){ return (Math.round(Math.random())-0.5); };
})
.controller('ListCtrl', function($scope, $stateParams)
{
$scope.Model.list = []
$scope.Model.data
.sort( $scope.Model.randOrd )
.forEach(function(i) {$scope.Model.list.push(i + " - " + $stateParams.value || "root")})
$scope.Model.selected = $scope.Model.list[0];
$scope.Model.select = function(index){
$scope.Model.selected = $scope.Model.list[index];
}
})
This should get some idea how we can use the features provided for us by UI-Router:
- Absolute Routes (^)
- Scope Inheritance by View Hierarchy Only
- View Names - Relative vs. Absolute Names
Check the above extract here, in the working example
Extend: new plunker here
If we do not want to have map view to be recreated, we can just omit that form the child state def:
.state('main.criteria', {
url: '^/criteria/:criteria/:value',
views: {
// 'map' : {
// templateUrl: 'tpl.map.html',
// controller: 'MapCtrl',
//},
'list' : {
templateUrl: 'tpl.list.html',
controller: 'ListCtrl',
},
},
})
Now our map VIEW will be just recieving changes in the model (could be watched) but view and controller won't be rerendered
ALSO, there is another plunker http://plnkr.co/edit/y0GzHv?p=preview which uses the controllerAs
.state('main', {
url: '/',
views: {
'@' : {
templateUrl: 'tpl.layout.html',
controller: 'MainCtrl',
controllerAs: 'main', // here
},
...
},
})
.state('main.criteria', {
url: '^/criteria/:criteria/:value',
views: {
'list' : {
templateUrl: 'tpl.list.html',
controller: 'ListCtrl',
controllerAs: 'list', // here
},
},
})
and that could be used like this:
<h4>{{main.hello()}}</h4>
<h4>{{list.hello()}}</h4>
The last plunker is here
This is an example of the way to go if I understand correctly:
$state.go('my.state', {id:data.id}, {notify:false, reload:false});
//And to remove the id from the url:
$state.go('my.state', {id:undefined}, {notify:false, reload:false});
From user l-liava-l in the issue https://github.com/angular-ui/ui-router/issues/64
You can check the $state
API here: http://angular-ui.github.io/ui-router/site/#/api/ui.router.state.$state
you can use scope inheritance to update url without refreshing view
$stateProvider
.state('itemList', {
url: '/itemlist',
templateUrl: 'Scripts/app/item/ItemListTemplate.html',
controller: 'ItemListController as itemList'
//abstract: true //abstract maybe?
}).state('itemList.itemDetail', {
url: '/:itemName/:itemID',
templateUrl: 'Scripts/app/item/ItemDetailTemplate.html',
controller: 'ItemDetailController as itemDetail',
resolve: {
'CurrentItemID': ['$stateParams',function ($stateParams) {
return $stateParams['itemID'];
}]
}
})
if child view is inside parent view both controllers share same scope.
so you can place a dummy (or neccessary) ui-view inside parent view which will be populated by child view.
and insert a
$scope.loadChildData = function(itemID){..blabla..};
function in parent controller which will be called by child controller on controller load. so when a user clicks
<a ui-sref="childState({itemID: 12})">bla</a>
only child controller and child view will be refreshed. then you can call parent scope function with necessary parameters.
The short answer ended up being do not put the map inside a view that changes. The accepted answer provides a lot more detail on how to structure a page with sub-views, but the key point is not to make the map part of the view but to connect its behaviour to a view that does change and to use a Controller to update the market icons.