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The Situation

  • Current Layout: The basic layout consists of a Header, a Left Navigation Bar (Sidebar), a Footer, and the Main Content Area.

  • The Task: I'm building a Preview Dialog/Modal.

  • Goal: When the preview dialog is opened, it should occupy the entire Main Content Area.

I need the preview dialog to dynamically resize when the user collapses or expands the Left Navigation Bar. Specifically, when the sidebar is collapsed, the preview dialog needs to automatically expand to fill the newly enlarged Main Content Area. I'm having trouble implementing this.

I tried to leverage the existing internal component for the navigation bar. I found a way to access the navigation bar's collapse/expand state within that component. However, when I try to import this state/component into my preview component (or anywhere else) and run pnpm run dev, I get an error saying the component cannot be imported. (It's a custom, internally-developed component.)

The preview dialog itself is currently implemented using position: fixed and I am explicitly setting its pixel dimensions to match the size of the Main Content Area.

Any suggestions on how to approach this dynamic resizing? How can I get the preview modal to react to the sidebar's width change, especially given the import issue with the internal component?

Possible Next Steps:

  • Should I be using a different positioning strategy than position: fixed?

  • Is there a common design pattern (like using Context or Redux/Zustand) to manage the sidebar's state globally that I should suggest to my team?

  • Are there CSS-only solutions for this kind of dynamic layout?

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The issue isnt really with the modal itself, but with how the sidebar's collapsed state is shared.

If you cant import the internal sidebar component, the best approach is to lift that collapse-expand state up, for example, by storing it in a React Context or a global store like Zustand. Then both the sidebar and the preview dialog can read the same state and re-render automatically when it changes.

That way, your preview dialog can simply use width: calc(100% - sidebarWidth) or flexbox to fill whatever space is available, without manually setting pixel values.

OR

A temporary CSS fix is to make the layout a flex container and position the dialog relative to the main content area instead of using position: fixed. That way, it naturally resizes as the sidebar width changes.

If this doesnt fix your problem, you can share it on codepen if possible, so I can have a closer look.

Cheers!

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