controller:ctrlfmt Badly formed controller string ''. Must match `__name__ as __id__` or `__name__`

Question

In rootes.js

.state('main.mydata', {
    url: '/my-data',
    templateUrl: '/app/views/pages/my-data.html',
    controller: 'mydataCtrl'
})

Controller

.controller('mydataCtrl', ['$scope', '$state', '$http', function($scope, $state, $http) {
    console.log("Came to My Data")
}])

when i call the page getting error in console

Error: angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=~%2fbundles%2fangular:13708 [$controller:ctrlfmt] Badly formed controller string ''. Must match `__name__ as __id__` or `__name__`.
http://errors.angularjs.org/1.5.7/$controller/ctrlfmt?p0=
    at http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7eNaNbundles%fangular:68:12
    at $controller (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:10199:17)
    at setupControllers (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:9331:34)
    at nodeLinkFn (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:9116:32)
    at compositeLinkFn (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:8510:13)
    at nodeLinkFn (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:9210:24)
    at compositeLinkFn (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:8510:13)
    at compositeLinkFn (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:8513:13)
    at compositeLinkFn (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:8513:13)
    at publicLinkFn (http://localhost:25282/Scripts/angular.js?bundleVirtualPath=%7e%fbundles%fangular:8390:30)

What may be the issue?

Answer 1

in page

my-data.html

There was div with empty controller name

<div ng-controller="">
  ..
</div>

because of this it was showing

Badly formed controller

Answer 2

I just encountered the same problem when calling $mdDialog using angular-material. My issue was that the string referencing my controller had a rogue space at the end. Double check that the string value of your controller key in the .state function object doesn't have any spaces.

Hope this helps anyone else seeing this error as well.