jQuery - vertical up toggle (i.e. not down)

Question

I need to create a toggle that animates upwards not downwards in other words the reverse of the "normal" toggle. Perhaps simpler is the toggle should slide up above the menu item (it's a menu) to become visible rather than slide down as the normal slideToggle etc. would do. I am nearly there with this :

var opened = false;
$("#coltab li").click(function(){
    if(opened){
        $(this).children('ul').animate({"top": "+=300px"});
    } else {
        $(this).children('ul').animate({"top": "-=300px"});
    }
    $(this).children('ul').children().slideToggle('slow');
    $(this).children('ul').toggle();
    opened = opened ? false : true;
});

BUT if you "toggle" an item THEN another item the second item (slides down) falls by the 300px NOT slide up (raises) by 300px. A good example (hate the site) of what I want to achieve is http://market.weogeo.com/#/home and the "tabs"at the bottom.

My HTML code is using

<ul id="#coltab">
<li>Item 1
<ul>
<li>This bit needs to toggle up</li>
</ul>
</li>
<li>Item 2
<ul>
<li>This bit needs to toggle up</li>
</ul>
</li>
etc ...
</ul>

On the CSS side

ul#coltab { position: relative' blah; blah; }

and

ul#coltab  ul { display: none; position: absolute; blah; blah; }

Any ideas?

It would be nice if each "click" closed the previous toggle before opening the "clicked" toggle.

Answer 1

I could give a more specific answer if you would have provided the actual CSS for your lists instead of filler.

Basically, you'll want to set the bottom property of ul#coltab ul to 0.

Generic example: http://jsfiddle.net/s7AD8/

ul#coltab  ul {
    position:absolute;
    bottom:0;
    /*...and so on*/
}

This will cause it to animate in an upward direction.

Answer 2

Try this one:

$("#coltab li ul").each(function (index) {
  $(this).data('height', $(this).outerHeight());    
});

$("#coltab li").click(function () {

    $("#coltab li ul.open").animate({"top": 0}, function () {
        $(this).removeClass('open');  
    });

    var itemHeight = $(this).children('ul').data('height');
    $(this).find('ul:not(.open)').animate({"top": -itemHeight}).addClass('open');

});

And add a new css class:

#coltab ul.open { display: block; }

Test it here

Answer 3

"-=300px" would feel better being a precalculated var.. (Can you even handle calculations in strings?)

Further if you wish to manipulated them independently I'd imagine you'll have a much easier time by providing IDs for the parts you want to handle