What steps can I take to maintain the horizontal scroll position of a div even after adding new elements to it?

Question

What steps can I take to maintain the horizontal scroll position of a div even after adding new elements to it?

I'm struggling to achieve an infinite x-scroll using HTMX. The issue I'm facing is that the request keeps getting triggered endlessly because the element that triggers it gets inserted on the left side of the div, causing a new request to load items inside the div.

Is there a way to prevent this from happening? Perhaps by appending the new elements while maintaining the x scroll position? It seems like it could be related to either a CSS or an HTMX problem, but I'm not certain.

<div class="flex h-full space-x-2">
  <div class="bg-amber-600 flex-initial w-1/4"></div>
  <div class="flex space-x-2 w-full overflow-x-auto">
    <div class="flex-none w-16 ml-auto" 
      hx-get="/scroll" 
      hx-trigger="intersect once" 
      hx-swap="outerHTML">
    </div>
    <div class="bg-amber-400 flex-none w-16">0</div>
    <div class="bg-amber-400 flex-none w-16">1</div>
    <div class="bg-amber-400 flex-none w-16">2</div>
    <div class="bg-amber-400 flex-none w-16">3</div>
  </div>
</div>

I also attempted using beforebegin, but encountered the same behavior:

<div class="bg-amber-400 flex-none w-16 ml-auto"
  hx-get="/scroll"
  hx-trigger="intersect once"
  hx-swap="beforebegin">x</div>

To better illustrate my issue, here's a codepen link: https://codepen.io/viggiesmalls/pen/RwQPROJ

javascript html css htmx

Answer 1

Answer №1

It's interesting to note that the scroll-x position of a div is maintained from the left edge, as it assumes content should appear on the right in a default LTR direction.

For an infinite x-scroll, adding items to the right seems like the most natural approach to avoid any issues.

Solutions

If you must add items to the left, here are some workarounds to consider:

Changing the CSS direction

One solution could be to set the container's direction to RTL so that items display from right to left with scroll position measured from the right edge.

.my-container {
  direction: rtl;
}

.my-container * {
  direction: ltr;
}

I had to rearrange your initial items for the desired outcome.

Check out the codepen example at: https://codepen.io/burikella/pen/ExJWeKQ

Manually adjusting scroll position with JS

Another option is to use custom JavaScript with 'htmx:beforeSwap' and 'htmx:afterSwap' events to reset the scroll position:

const container = document.getElementById("infinite-x-scroll");

container.addEventListener('htmx:beforeSwap', function(evt) {
  const scrollDiff = container.scrollWidth - container.scrollLeft;
  container.attributes['data-last-scroll'] = scrollDiff;
});

container.addEventListener('htmx:afterSwap', function(evt) {
  const scrollDiff = container.scrollWidth - container.scrollLeft;
  const lastDiff = container.attributes['data-last-scroll'];
    if (typeof lastDiff === "number" && scrollDiff !== lastDiff) {
      container.scrollLeft = container.scrollWidth - lastDiff;
    }
});

To ensure smooth functionality, I adjusted how the delay was implemented by adding it to the trigger instead of the swap:

<div class="h-[400px] flex-none w-16 ml-auto" hx-get="/scroll" hx-trigger="intersect delay:0.5s" hx-swap="outerHTML"></div>

View the updated codepen at: https://codepen.io/burikella/pen/zYXZJNW

Answer 2

It's interesting to note that the scroll-x position of a div is maintained from the left edge, as it assumes content should appear on the right in a default LTR direction.

For an infinite x-scroll, adding items to the right seems like the most natural approach to avoid any issues.

Solutions

If you must add items to the left, here are some workarounds to consider:

Changing the CSS direction

One solution could be to set the container's direction to RTL so that items display from right to left with scroll position measured from the right edge.

.my-container {
  direction: rtl;
}

.my-container * {
  direction: ltr;
}

I had to rearrange your initial items for the desired outcome.

Check out the codepen example at: https://codepen.io/burikella/pen/ExJWeKQ

Manually adjusting scroll position with JS

Another option is to use custom JavaScript with 'htmx:beforeSwap' and 'htmx:afterSwap' events to reset the scroll position:

const container = document.getElementById("infinite-x-scroll");

container.addEventListener('htmx:beforeSwap', function(evt) {
  const scrollDiff = container.scrollWidth - container.scrollLeft;
  container.attributes['data-last-scroll'] = scrollDiff;
});

container.addEventListener('htmx:afterSwap', function(evt) {
  const scrollDiff = container.scrollWidth - container.scrollLeft;
  const lastDiff = container.attributes['data-last-scroll'];
    if (typeof lastDiff === "number" && scrollDiff !== lastDiff) {
      container.scrollLeft = container.scrollWidth - lastDiff;
    }
});

To ensure smooth functionality, I adjusted how the delay was implemented by adding it to the trigger instead of the swap:

<div class="h-[400px] flex-none w-16 ml-auto" hx-get="/scroll" hx-trigger="intersect delay:0.5s" hx-swap="outerHTML"></div>

View the updated codepen at: https://codepen.io/burikella/pen/zYXZJNW

What steps can I take to maintain the horizontal scroll position of a div even after adding new elements to it?

Answer №1

Solutions

Changing the CSS direction

Manually adjusting scroll position with JS

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