Vertically center text in a box without knowing how many lines - html

Question

This is driving me crazy I just don't understand why this piece of simple css to vertically center an element in a div doesn't work as expected.
this is the html:
<div class="header-a-wrapper" style="
line-height: 48px;
height: 48px;
background: red;
display: block;
text-align: center;
">
<a href="/user/5659186348163072" class="right" style="
background: blue;
line-height: normal;
display: inline-block;
vertical-align: middle;
float: none;
height: 20px;
">medical salamander</a>
</div>
the inner element does not get centered vertically but I really think it should
here is an html with the two elements:
http://alephz.com/test.html
and this is the CRAZY part. here is a jsfiddle with the same html and over there it works! tested on the same chrome/win7!
http://jsfiddle.net/pkrsdqkb/

Answer 1

Very weird, but if you want to solve it, you add to 'a':
position: relative;
top: 50%;
transform: translateY(-50%);
Remove
vertical-align: middle;
float: none;

Answer 2

One option to play nicely with vertical-align: middle is to use display: table and display: table-cell.
The wrapper gets display: table and width: 100%
Wrap the links in a div which will act as a "table cell" with display: table-cell
vertical-align: middle will now work as you expect it to.
Compatibility: display: table is good for IE 8 + and modern browsers everywhere.
Example:
.header-a-wrapper {
background: red;
display: table;
text-align: center;
height: 100px;
width: 100%;
}
.vertical {
display: table-cell;
vertical-align: middle;
}
.right {
background: blue;
display: block;
margin: 2px 0;
}
<div class="header-a-wrapper">
<div class="vertical">
medical salamander
medical salamander
</div>
</div>
Old answer
There is a lot of redundant CSS.
The vertical center is applied through: line-height: 48px.
Leave that on the wrapper and remove all the positioning CSS properties on a.right.
Example:
.header-a-wrapper {
line-height: 48px;
background: red;
display: block;
text-align: center;
}
.right {
background: blue;
}
<div class="header-a-wrapper">
medical salamander
</div>