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Collapsible Sidebar Without Visible Reflow on Content Inside

I have a 3 column layout where I want the left and right columns to be collapsible. I want the following:
A smooth slide
Sidebars that have a percentage width
No visible reflow on the sidebar content
No white-space: nowrap;, as this will mess with the display of the sidebar content.
Allow for complex content inside the sidebar, not just simple text in a <p> tag as in the codepen example below.
No hardcoded pixel widths - I know you can add a width on an inner div together with overflow:hidden on the parent, but I don't want to hardcode a large width.
I need the sidebar widths to be relative to the immediate parent (and not the viewport), in case the 3-column layout needs to be within a section of a page (in fact in my scenario that's the case).
Note that the I've tried transitioning on the width property in this codepen, but you can see the visible reflow of content inside the sidebar. Here's a .gif of it:
Ideally I'd like to do this without using JavaScript for the animation, but I'm open to it if there are no other good solutions.

One way to do this I would say is to give a % based width to your pabel-content.
Add these two properties to the class like this
.panel-content {
min-width: 300px;
}
This should remove the wrapping while animation.

How to drop max-height/overflow properties when Bootstrap column layout changes

I have two col elements in a single Bootstrap row/container. The left side one is a fixed size, containing a static table. The right side one contains a table, like the left, but is dynamically generated based on data retrieved when the page is loaded.
So, of course the right table can be taller than the left one. I've got the right table's max-height property set to the left table's height, and overflow-y: scroll, figured out in JavaScript. This looks and works great on desktop.
Code gist for reference, HTML:
<div class="container">
<div class="row">
<div class="col">
<table id="tblLegend">...</table>
</div>
<div class="col">
<table id="tblStops">...</table>
</div>
</div>
</div>
JavaScript:
$(document).ready(function() {
var mxHt = $("#tblLegend").css("height");
$("#tblStops").css("max-height", mxHt)
.css("overflow-y", "scroll");
});
However, I'd like to be able to remove the max-height (and subsequently, the overflow-y) property from the tblStops element if the page is displaying in a mobile format, or is resized to a mobile screen's size. In this case, the two tables would be stacked on top of one another vertically, and there would be no need for a separate scroll pane for mobile devices. (Not to mention that an internal scroll pane on mobile is irritating and difficult to control sometimes).
Is there a relatively easy way to do this without resorting to window.size or window.resize events? I just don't like the idea of having to check for hardcoded screen/window dimensions.

You can detect the screen size in JavaScript. As you are using JQuery:
if ($(window).width() < 700) {
$("#tblStops").css("max-height", "auto")
.css("overflow-y", "auto");
}
Auto value will add or remove scroll according to the requirement in overflow. In height minimum height will be applied for content.
NOTE: Might not work with Iphone's.
EDIT: width() will return value based on browsers and for iphone width 700 might not work.

Dynamically generated “floating divs” with even width but not even heights, align issue

I will be very appreciative if anyone has a lead how to solve this:
Problem description:
we have Dynamically generated “floating divs” with even witdh but not even heights.(content based) .
the “Parent container” will have diffrent width parameters to allow 2,3,4 (in attached example 2 columns and 3 )divs to fits it’s width.
divs order is left to right, always by hirarchical order 1,2,3 etc...
How can we achieve this without creating gaps? ( casued by traditional floats method).
Number of divs is dynamically created and not limited...
Solution should be ie8,ie9 compatible
thanks, Jonathan. ![enter image description here][1]
example illustration can be found here:
https://app.box.com/s/6y89dlan1jt8bpjvcgb9

Have you considered using something like Masonry?

Pure CSS solution - Cross Browser (IE6+)
Use a column layout instead of floating.
This Working Fiddle demonstrate a 3 column layout, but you can easily change it to N column.
For a N Column Layout, you'll need to create N containers, each of 100/N width, and fill them accordingly.
You just have to build your dynamic content in the right order. (put the dynamic div in the right column each time).
Here's the basic HTML & CSS for the 3 column layout
<div class="Container">
</div>
<div class="Container">
</div>
<div class="Container">
</div>
.Container {
float: left;
width: 31.33%;
margin: 1%;
}
The script in the fiddle is for the sole purpose of adding dynamic content.
and although the content that I had have a fixed height, it will obviously work with changing heights as well.
BTW: for a 2 column layout, you Don't need this. just make the odd item float left, and the even items float right. Like This

Hide child <div>s as parent div shrinks?

I am trying to write a zoom in/out feature on a web app I am making using the jqueryUI slider.
I am having difficulty handling when my parent div shrinks too much, and cramps its child containers.
<div class="puck originator inline-block" style="width: 310.5px; left: 0px;">
<div class="conflicted inline-block originator">
<div class="right-number">I should stay</div>
<div class="left-number">I should stay</div>
<div class="middle-number">I Should disapper</div>
</div>
</div>
Here is the relevant section of code I have
http://jsfiddle.net/aQKwE/
Basically I have the parent div (class 'puck') that is being shrunk using a jquery slider. For this code I just used a text box, but same idea.
When I shrink that div, the containing divs stick around and are very garbled.
I want to be able to remove the middle child div when it becomes to cramped, leaving the left and right child divs to occupy all the space
Furthermore, if it becomes to cramped yet after that, I want to remove the right div, leaving only the left.
Finally I want to be able to remove all contents so that nothing more than the background of the parent shows.
Is there a way to do this easily, preferably through CSS? I don't want to write more javascript code to set 'display:none' on each child div, since it seems like some CSS rules should handle this.
Any ideas?

There's not really any logic built into CSS to handle something like this. You can set rules based on viewport size, but that won't help in this case.
I updated your jsfiddle with this code so you can test it and see what you think, but essentially I just added some checks in your javascript function to hide based on the width submitted.
var newwidth = $('#text').val();
$(".middle-number").show();
$(".right-number").show();
if (newwidth < 280) {
$(".middle-number").hide();
}
if (newwidth < 180) {
$(".right-number").hide();
}
$('.puck').css('width',newwidth);

How to implement a vertical slide controller in a height limited div with many objects

I'm nearly 2 months old in studying HTML, JavaScript and jQuery. I've done a few things but never figured out how to implement a DIV (or anything you may suggest) to emulate a viewport which would display text, textarea, buttons, anchors etc all of which simply cannot fit or be seen within the size of the viewport. Therefore the use of the vertical scroll. No need for horizontal scrolling, though. I can format the objects not to exceed the horizontal view. I thought of using a div inside another div, but the objects inside the INNER DIV just bleed through and show up on the bottom of the site!
Is there some magical panel in jQuery created for that purpose?
TIA
Dennis

If you have a containing div such as <div id="container">, you can add the following properties to it to get it's content to scroll vertically:
div#container {
overflow-y: auto;
height: 100px;
}
This CSS will show a vertical scroll bar if the div's content exceeds it's height. The only caveat with this solution is you must set a height on the div.
Here's an example.