Hey there, I'm facing a bit of a puzzle with a seemingly simple question that's got me stumped.

In my code, I have a nested array structure:

$scope.rootItem = {
        id: '1',
        type: 'course',
        title: 'Adobe Photoshop CC for beginners',
        items: [{
            id: '2',
            type: 'label',
            title:'Label Title',
            items:[{
                id: '3',
                type: 'module',
                title:'Module title',
                items: [{
                    id: '4',
                    type: 'topic',
                    title:'Topic title',
                    items: [{
                        id: '5',
                        type: 'content',
                        title:'Content title'
                    }, {
                        id: '6',
                        type: 'content',
                        title:'Content title'
                    }]
                }]
            },{
                id: '7',
                type: 'resources',
                title:'Resources'
            },{
                id: '8',
                type: 'module',
                title:'Module title',
                items: [{
                    id: '9',
                    type: 'topic',
                    title:'Topic',
                    items: [{
                        id: '10',
                        type: 'question',
                        title:'Question title'
                    }]
                }, {
                    id: '11',
                    type: 'topic',
                    title:'Topic title',
                    items: [{
                        id: '12',
                        type: 'content',
                        title:'Content title'
                    }]
                }]
            }]
        },{
            id: '14',
            type: 'assessmentLabel',
            title: 'Assessment Label',
            items: [{
                id: '15',
                type: 'assessment',
                title: 'Assessment Title',
                items: [{
                    id: '16',
                    type: 'courseAssessment',
                    title: 'Course Assessment Question',
                    items: []
                }]
            }]
        }]
    };

This data is displayed using ng-repeat and everything works smoothly, including the sorting functionality implemented with ng-sortable (using JQuery UI Sortable).

Now, here's where I need your help - I'm trying to duplicate an item with ID: 5 using angular.copy().

The HTML setup:

<a href="" title="Duplicate Content" data-ng-click="duplicate(ngModelItem, $parent.ngModelItem.items)">
<span class="icon-duplicate"></span>
</a>

The duplication process seems to be working well, as I can pass the object to the function without any issues. However, when I attempt to push the duplicated object into its parent's array, I encounter a problem where $parent.ngModelItem.items is returning as undefined.

Here's the controller code:

$scope.duplicate = function(item, parent) {
        var itemCopy = angular.copy(item);

        parent.push(item);
    };

And this is how the HTML with ng-repeat looks like:

<ul class="apps-container" ui-sortable="sortableOptions" ng-model="ngModelItem.items" ng-class="ngModelItem.type">
            <li class="innerCont" ng-repeat="innerItem in ngModelItem.items">
                <tg-dynamic-directive ng-model="innerItem" tg-dynamic-directive-view="getView">
                </tg-dynamic-directive>
            </li>
        </ul>

Despite my attempts to pass the parent's ngModelItem.items (rootItem.items), it appears Angular has different ideas on how this should work. So, the big question remains - how can I successfully access the parent's ngModelItem.items array?

I would appreciate it if someone could explain why

{{$parent.$parent.ngModelItems.id}}

returns the correct parent ID, but when I try to pass that parent to the function like

data-ng-click="duplicate(parent.parent.ngModelItem.items)"

It doesn't seem to work as expected.

Below is the directive code snippet for reference:

angular.module('tg.dynamicDirective', [])
    .directive('tgDynamicDirective', ['$compile',
        function($compile) {
            'use strict';

            function templateUrlProvider(getView, ngModelItem) {
                if (getView) {
                    if (typeof getView === 'function') {
                        var templateUrl = getView(ngModelItem) || '';
                        if (templateUrl) {
                            return templateUrl;
                        }
                    } else if (typeof getView === 'string' && getView.length) {
                        return getView;
                    }
                }
                return '';
            }

            return {
                restrict: 'E',
                require: '^ngModel',
                scope: true,
                template: '<div ng-include="templateUrl"></div>',
                link: function(scope, element, attrs, ngModel) {

                    scope.$watch(function() {
                        var ngModelItem = scope.$eval(attrs.ngModel);
                        var getView = scope.$eval(attrs.tgDynamicDirectiveView);
                        scope.ngModelItem = ngModelItem;
                        return templateUrlProvider(getView, ngModelItem);
                    }, function(newValue, oldValue) {
                        scope.templateUrl = newValue;
                    });
                }
            };
        }
    ]);