Does jQuery have a plugin to display a "message bar" like the Twitter "wrong password" bar at the top of screen?

Question

Twitter will pop down a message bar at the top of the screen say "Wrong password" and after 10 seconds, it will slide up and disappear. Chrome also shows "Do you want to save the password" message box using such a way.

Does jQuery have a plug in to do that already? Does it also work in IE 6? Because usually, the display of relative to the viewport (using position: fixed) will not work on IE 6. thanks.

Update: thanks for the nice solutions -- I deliberately wanted it to work (1) even when the user has scrolled down the page, that it will show at the top of the window screen and (2) the bar might be chosen to display at the bottom of window screen instead (as an option)... and if it works on IE 6 then it is even better... poor programmers nowadays...

Answer 1

You can do this with just a few lines of code, like this:

​​​​function topBar(​​​message) {
  $("<div />", { 'class': 'topbar', text: message }).hide().prependTo("body")
      .slideDown('fast').delay(10000).slideUp(function() { $(this).remove(); });
}

Then just give the class you use some styling, for example:

.topbar { 
    background: #990000; 
    border-bottom: solid 2px #EEE; 
    padding: 3px 0; 
    text-align: center; 
    color: white;
}​

You can view a working demo here, tweak as needed :) This creates a <div> on the fly, adds it to the top of the body, so no funky positioning to worry about, this should be just fine in IE6. When it's finished it'll slideUp and remove the <div> it created to cleanup. You can add a click handler to remove it instantly, etc, whatever your needs are.

Answer 2

Well I played around and came up with this nice function:

[ live example on http://jsfiddle.net/2arVf/ ]

//
// Usage: sendMessage(message, yes_text, no_text, class_to_style, callback_yes, callback_no)  -- for yes/no
//    or: sendMessage(message, class_to_style[, timeout])  -- informative with optional auto-hide after timeout
//

var sendMessage = function(str,yes,no,my_class,callback_yes,callback_no) {

    clearMessageTimeout(); // clear the timeout so it doesn't accidentaly slide up

    if (typeof no == 'string') {   // check if this is a yes/no message

        $message.slideUp(0, function() {  // slide up if not already
            // scroll to the top so the user gets to see the message             
            $("html").animate({'scrollTop': 0}, 'fast', function() {    // then
                $message
                .unbind('mouseout').attr('class','')      // kill old classes
                .addClass(my_class)    // add our class styling
                .html([ str, '<br />', // create an array to add our
                                       // two handlers with #yes and #no IDs
                        '<button id="yes">', yes ,'</button>',
                        '<button id="no">' , no  ,'</button>'
                      ].join('')       // join the array and
                     )                 // insert message
                .slideDown(1000)       // slide the message down
                .find('#yes,#no')      // find #yes and #no
                .click(function() {    // add click handler to #yes and #no                            
                    var answer=$(this).attr('id');           // should be 'yes' or 'no'
                    $message.slideUp(1000, function() {      // slide up and
                        $("html").animate({'scrollTop': 0},  // scroll to top again and
                            eval('callback_' + answer)       // call our callback
                        );
                    });
                });     
            });        
        });

    } else {                  

        $message
            .unbind('mouseout')                // unbind previous mouseout
            .attr('class','')                  // kill old classes
            .addClass(yes)                     // add our class
            .html(str)                         // insert our message
            .slideDown(1000, function() {      // slide down the message
            $message.mouseout(function() {     // bind mouse out
                setMessageTimeout(function() { // with a timeout if the pointer comes back
                    $message.slideUp(1000);    // to slide back up
                }, 1000);                      // after 1 second
            });                           
        });

        if (typeof no == 'number') {       // if a timeout is specified
            setMessageTimeout(function() { // then it sets it
                $message.slideUp(1000);    // to slide up by itself
            }, no);                        // after x milliseconds
        }
    }
}

// Initialize messenger

$("<div></div>").prependTo('body').attr('id','message');

var $message = $("#message")
    .mousemove(clearMessageTimeout),
    message_timeout;

function setMessageTimeout(callback, time) {
    clearTimeout(message_timeout);
    message_timeout = setTimeout(callback, time);
}

function clearMessageTimeout() {
    clearTimeout(message_timeout);
}

Example:

$(".invoke_message").click(function(e) {

    sendMessage(

        [ 'Here I am, a message..',
          'I can be multiline',
          '<strong>and have any html</strong>',,
          'Do you like me?'
        ].join('<br />'),

        'Yeap','Nope',  // yes and no text

        'normal',       // normal class

        function() {    // yes callback
            sendMessage('Thank you. I\'ll be gone in 3 secs', 'happy', 3000);
        },

        function() {    // no callback
            sendMessage('OK, have it your way then. You need to mouseout me to make me leave', 'sad');
        }

    );

    return false;
});

CSS:

body {
    padding:0;
    margin:0;
}
strong {
    font-weight:bold;
}
#message {
    color:#fff;
    text-align:center;
}
.normal {
    background-color:#888;
}
.happy {
    background-color:#cc2;
}
.sad {
    background-color:#b44;
}

HTML:

<p>I'm the main page. I'll do some space if there is a message</p>
<p><a class="invoke_message" href="#">Click me</a></p>
.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br />.<br /><p><a class="invoke_message" href="#">Click me too</a></p>