Ways to obtain the height of a UL element while the display property is configured to flex

Question

Ways to obtain the height of a UL element while the display property is configured to flex

While I was blockwise segregating elements of a webpage and drawing borders around those blocks, I encountered an issue where the height turned out to be 0 when the display was set to flex. How can I retrieve the height in such scenarios? I experimented with various methods but they all yielded 0

ul.offsetHeight // yields 0
ul.clientHeight // yields 0
ul.getBoundingClientRect() // also gives me 0
window.getComputedStyle(ul).height // shows 100%

//Even this method returns 0
var range = document.createRange()
range.selectNodeContents(ul)
range.getBoundingClientRect()

UPDATE

Turns out, the issue had nothing to do with the flex property. The height displayed as 0 simply because the element was not visible on the screen at that moment. I don't wish to delete the question since some people have already devoted their time to it.

javascript jquery css flexbox

Answer 1

Answer №1

Have you considered the possibility that your element is being dynamically created? It's important to ensure that you're not trying to retrieve its height before it has actually been created. In my experience, assigning an id to the div and accessing its height property directly usually works without any issues. So, double check whether you are fetching the data too early or if the height has been inadvertently set to 0 at some point.

If your goal is to target multiple ul elements simultaneously rather than a specific one, make sure to obtain the height of each item in the array individually, such as ul[0].

//Single Call
document.getElementById('one').innerHTML = document.getElementById('someDiv').clientHeight;

//Multi Call
var multi = document.getElementsByTagName('ul');
document.getElementById('two').innerHTML = multi[1].clientHeight;

ul {
  background: #f00;
  display: flex;
  flex-direction: column;
}

<p>
  <ul id="someDiv">
    <li>One</li>
    <li>Two</li>
    <li>Three</li>
  </ul>
</p>
<p>
  <ul id="anotherDiv">
    <li>One</li>
    <li>Two</li>
    <li>Three</li>
    <li>Four</li>
  </ul>
<p>
<p>First ul Height: <span id="one"> - </span></p>
<p>Second ul Height: <span id="two"> - </span></p>

Answer 2

Have you considered the possibility that your element is being dynamically created? It's important to ensure that you're not trying to retrieve its height before it has actually been created. In my experience, assigning an id to the div and accessing its height property directly usually works without any issues. So, double check whether you are fetching the data too early or if the height has been inadvertently set to 0 at some point.

If your goal is to target multiple ul elements simultaneously rather than a specific one, make sure to obtain the height of each item in the array individually, such as ul[0].

//Single Call
document.getElementById('one').innerHTML = document.getElementById('someDiv').clientHeight;

//Multi Call
var multi = document.getElementsByTagName('ul');
document.getElementById('two').innerHTML = multi[1].clientHeight;

ul {
  background: #f00;
  display: flex;
  flex-direction: column;
}

<p>
  <ul id="someDiv">
    <li>One</li>
    <li>Two</li>
    <li>Three</li>
  </ul>
</p>
<p>
  <ul id="anotherDiv">
    <li>One</li>
    <li>Two</li>
    <li>Three</li>
    <li>Four</li>
  </ul>
<p>
<p>First ul Height: <span id="one"> - </span></p>
<p>Second ul Height: <span id="two"> - </span></p>

Answer 3

Answer №2

I attempted the following method:

document.write(document.querySelector('ul').offsetHeight);

ul {
  display: flex;
  margin: 0;
  padding: 0;
  list-style: none;
}

<ul>
  <li>a</li>
  <li>a</li>
  <li>a</li>
  <li>a</li>
</ul>

Answer 4

I attempted the following method:

document.write(document.querySelector('ul').offsetHeight);

ul {
  display: flex;
  margin: 0;
  padding: 0;
  list-style: none;
}

<ul>
  <li>a</li>
  <li>a</li>
  <li>a</li>
  <li>a</li>
</ul>

Ways to obtain the height of a UL element while the display property is configured to flex

Answer №1

Answer №2

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