how to make navigation bar stretch across the page (HTML) - html

Question

I'm having problems with my navigation bar, its not stretching across the page.
Here's the code:
#nav {
list-style: none;
font-weight: bold;
margin-bottom: 10px;
width: 100%;
text-align: center;
}
#nav ul {
list-style-type: none;
margin: 0px;
padding: 0;
}
#nav li {
margin: 0px;
display:
}
#nav li a {
padding: 10px;
text-decoration: none;
font-weight: bold;
color: #FFFFFF;
background-color: #000000;
float: left
}
#nav li a:hover {
color: #FFFFFF;
background-color: #35af3b;
}
<div id="nav">
<ul>
<li>Home
</li>
<li>Music
</li>
<li>Education
</li>
<li>Fun
</li>
<li>Entertainment
</li>
<li>Utilities
</li>
</ul>
</div>

Answer 1

It isn't exactly clear what you want here. If you're wanting the nav bar to continue across the page you need to add the background color to the parent div and make this div the same height as the ul list elements:
#nav {
list-style: none;
font-weight: bold;
margin-bottom: 10px;
width: 100%;
text-align: center;
background-color: #000000;
height:40px;
}
I did a fiddle - http://jsfiddle.net/F6nMg/

Answer 2

Put the background color on the container of the navigation bar (the div). Then, apply a clearfix to the div because the contents are floated. You could probably also use display: inline-block, but you don't have to.
#nav {
background-color: #000000;
}
#nav:after {
content: "";
clear: both;
display: table;
}
http://jsfiddle.net/ExplosionPIlls/DY6Nb/

Answer 3

I understand your problem. this can be achieved by putting display:table on parent div and display:table-cell on all lis in navbar.Then all will behave like teable-cells and take width according to provided space. Read my article at: http://www.aurigait.com/blog/how-to-make-navigation-bar-stretch-across-the-page/
Or Look at the below structure for example:
<nav class="main-menu">
<ul>
<li>Small Link</li>
<li>Another Link</li>
<li>One Another Link</li>
<li class="sp-width">A long link with 40% of total width</li>
</ul>
</nav>
And CSS
ul, li{ list-style:none; margin:0; padding:0;}/*1.1*/
.main-menu ul{background-color:black;} /*1.2*/
.main-menu a{color:white; display:block; padding:5px; text-decoration:none;} /*1.2, 1.3*/
.main-menu a:hover{background -color:#333333; text-decoration:none; color:white;}/*1.2*/
.main-menu > ul{ display:table; width:100%;} /*2.1, 2.2*/
.main-menu > ul > li{ display:table-cell; border-right:1px solid #d4d4d4;} /*3.1, 3.2 */
.main-menu > ul > li:last-child{ border-right:none;}/*3.2*/
.main-menu > ul > li > a{ text-align:center;}/*2*/
.sp-width{ width:40%;}
Now lets add 3 more links in it, so HTML Structure will now:
<nav class="main-menu">
<ul>
<li>Small Link</li>
<li>Another Link</li>
<li>One Another Link</li>
<li>Another Link</li>
<li>Another Link</li>
<li>Another Link</li>
<li class="sp-width">A long link with 40% of total width</li>
</ul>
</nav>
So CSS changes:
.main-menu > ul > li{ display:table-cell; border-right:1px solid #d4d4d4; width:10%;} /*4*/
.sp-width{ width:40%!important;} /*5*/
Points to be noted:
1.1. Global Definition
1.2. Global Definition for Main menu all uls and links. (In case of Sub-menu it will be applied on that sub-menu also)
1.3. Using display:block, so it will cover entire area of li and whole li will be click-able.
2.
2.1. I am using ‘>’(Direct Child) here so if we define any sub-menu inside, this CSS will not work on that.
2.2. ‘Width’ property is necessary with ‘display:table’. Because default width of display:table is ‘Auto’ means as per the inside content.
3.
3.1.Display:table-cell, divides the total width / remaining width(the un-divided width. In our case it is 100%-40%=60%) equally. It always need display:table on its parent container.
3.2. I am using border-right for showing links separately and removing extra border on last-child in the next line.
4. How width is distributed, if we define it explicitly:
4.1. If width is more than the average width(100% / No. of links) then it will give that width to first link and then from remaining if possible then to second link and then rest to other link and if no width left then to rest of the links as per content (with text wrapping as default) and remaining width in proportion as we provided. Example: we have 4 links and we define 50% width for each. So it will assign 3rd and 4th link as per the content and to 2nd and 1st link remaining width’s 50 %.
4.2. If width is less than the average width, it will distribute the width equally in all links.
4.3. If one link is having some specific width and we want all other links with a particular width (Our Case), It will provide the given width to that link(s) and then remaining width will be divided equally to all links including the specific width link.
5. We provide ‘!important’ here because of ‘order of precedence’. The hierarchical definitions have more weight than the class definitions. And ‘!important’ provides supreme power to class definition so it will be applied. I will discuss on Order of Precedence in my later blog.

Answer 4

Make sure in your HTML code, the list elements are under a separate container element, Assign background color to this new container.
For e.g.
.container-nav {
background: #ff3300;
}
<header class="container">
<h1> Monthly Resolutions </h1>
<h2 class=header-h> Dreaming out loud. Take 30 days at a time</h2>
</header>
<div class="container-nav">
<nav class="container">
<ul>
<li>Home
</li>
<li>Archives
</li>
<li>About Me
</li>
</ul>
<div class="clear"></div>
</nav>
<!--nav-->
</div>
<!--container-nav-->

Answer 5

Use this if you want the nav bar to always appear on the top of the screen (Just like stackoverflow's navbar ;)
#nav {
overflow: hidden;
display: flex;
flex-direction: row;
position: fixed !important;
left: 0 !important;
top: 0 !important;
width: 100%;
}

Answer 6

you should use
#nav {
width:100%;
}