Why does my CSS tooltip push my other content down?

Question

I have a CSS tooltip, with CSS3 fade in, with z-indexes set to 999. When I hover over the link, the tooltip itself pushes my other content down, it's meant to be above, not inline, although I've used a span and converted it to block..

Here is an example of what I'm going for, how can I stop it from pushing the content down?

Thanks.

Answer 1

Display:block doesn't take an element out of the page flow, it simply pushes it onto its own new line. Using position:absolute - as recommended by other posters - should work for you. Position:absolute will set a position (such as top:0px; left:20px;) to the browser window overall unless there is a parent with position:relative set (which would then become the point of reference). An example of this second type would be positioning a link exactly 30px from the right within a given content div - regardless of where that div is placed on the page.

Position:relative can be used to position an element relative to its original position in the natural page flow, and it leaves a space where the element would have been. Position:fixed can be used for elements that should not move when the page is scrolled (such as a fixed navigation bar, page branding, or footer). Position:static is the default position setting, and should be used when you need to override another position type.

If you're using a span for the tooltip text within another element - you'll likely want to set the parent element to position:relative, and set the inner span to position:absolute. You'll need to set a top and left value to adjust where exactly your tooltip text falls (ie. above or below the parent element, to the left or the right).

I hope this is helpful.