ngInclude behavior change from 1.2.1 -> 1.2.2

[matthughes]

If you have a directive on an ng-include attribute, it appears the content is not loaded prior to executing your directive's link function. In 1.2.0 and 1.2.1, the following code would have children().length == 1. In 1.2.2, the content doesn't get included until after this directive is executed. I tried setting the priority of my directive but it still gets invoked before the template has been loaded.

What is the expected behavior here? Is it defined? Do I just need to add an onload event handler in case the child gets loaded subsequent to my directive's link function being called? (I tried running this in post-link but behavior was the same).

// Full plunkr showing the problem. Just change angular version.
http://plnkr.co/edit/VWA0JTcpNDoNZkTrmllA?p=preview

<ng-include my-custom-directive src="'myTemplate.html'"></ng-include>

app.directive('myCustomDirective', function() {
    return {
      restrict: 'A',
      link: function(scope, element, attrs) {

        window.alert(element.children().length);

       }
     };
   });

[tbosch]

Thanks for reporting!
This is a regression and was probably introduced by this commit: 0a7cbb3

In 1.2.1 we updated the element's content before executing the transclusion link function. Now we are first executing the transclusion link function and assigning the template afterwards.

A possible solution: Define two ng-include directives

1. Does the transclude
2. No transclude, but adds the html to children.

By this directives with lower priority would see the filled html.

Same applies to ngView (changed here: e6521e7)

[caitp]

it would be pretty easy to create those directives with minimal/DRY code, but perhaps it would be good to consider other solutions first

[tbosch]

Discussed with @IgorMinar to fix this with secondary ngInclude and ngView directives (ngView is affected by this bug as well), as it's the simplest way to do it.