Hi!
I have following issue: if "this" keyword used in source binding, MVVM recreates the whole DOM starting from this node if any child value of "this" observable model changes. here is a fiddle to reproduce it:
http://jsfiddle.net/uBgnr/21/ 

If instead of "this" model member is used, DOM is not recreated, here is another fiddle:
http://jsfiddle.net/uBgnr/20/

In this case I could avoid this behavior, but I have following scenario and I could not change data structure:
I have an array of elements to be bind in a div. But the problem is: each of element has it's own template, stored in field "template", so I could do following:

this will work, but as I said if any child field of  my view model will be changed, MVVM recreates div with "source:this" binding

using "#if" inside element template is not an option, templates are huge, and could be used also not only within "elements" binding, so I need to copy/paste them, its dirty. 

Suggestion: it would be nice something like this:

Please help.

Hello Alex,

By design if a template is bound to the entire viewModel object (data-bind="source: this") on change of a child value the framework will refresh the whole template DOM. Thus is because when you set the value of a child property the change event of the viewModel object fires.
I am afraid that I cannot suggest another workaround except the one you already found - to bind the template to a model member.

Regards,
Alexander Valchev
the Telerik team