In this episode, we dive into one of the most requested UI snippets: creating an auto-hiding navigation bar, just like on the CodeCourse site. You know, that slick effect where the navbar hides as you scroll down for more content space, then pops back into view the moment you scroll up (since you probably want to navigate somewhere else)? We're building exactly that!
We kick things off by structuring and styling a basic navigation component with fixed height and width, making sure it's ready for JavaScript magic. Even though this example uses Vue.js for structure (because that's what CodeCourse runs), the exact same idea works if you're using plain JavaScript or even jQuery.
Once the CSS groundwork is done (setting up the fixed nav, hiding it with a negative top value, and making sure content isn't hidden underneath), we jump into the JavaScript. The secret sauce is listening for scroll events and keeping track of the scroll position. As you scroll down past the nav's height, the nav slides out of view. Scroll up, and it returns.
We walk through step by step how to:
By the end, you'll have a clean, practical sliding navigation effect you can drop into your own project, regardless of your frontend stack. Super handy for giving users a bit more screen real estate while still keeping navigation close by!