"Kinda surprised this isn't easier."

I'm surprised it doesn't seem easy. To center with jQuery I just do this to an element:

$("#element").css({"position" : "fixed", "top" : ($(window).height() / 2) - ($("#element").height() / 2), "left": ($(document).width() - $("#element").width()) / 2});

This assumes that the element in question is on the page, sized to be a popup and is hidden on the page which is then shown at some point. My project code this is pulled from uses a fadein but I removed that for this post. Since the element is position fixed if you scroll it stays centered in the window. You would have to run the code again on a window resize though.

Is it exactly centered? Probably not but it's close enough that most people wouldn't notice.

This works for me on every browser I tried except for IE6. And the thing that fails on IE6 is the fixed position since it is not supported. For that I look for IE6 and apply a 100% height on the body/html tags with an absolute position on the element instead of fixed.

My project this code is from only has the one modal element so I suppose if a project required several I would make it a plugin or at least a function to avoid rewriting code.

"I'm surprised it doesn't seem easy."

Heh, well, I'm still learning. :)

Nice technique there, and it makes sense.

Reading back over my post it seems to me I was a bit harsh in the wording, I didn't mean for it to be that way.

The reason it seemed easy to me is because I transitioned from Actionscript to Javascript and doing things like that in Flash is common since you are usually directly controlling positions with code.

Reading back over my post again I notice my code only works for a popup style element and not centering in an element on the page. Although that should be much the same with using the parent element to grab height and width to center by instead of the window. I'll have to try that one.

Wow, my credentials disappeared from my post.

I always seem to have hiccups with posting here. For instance, I always have to preview my post to get the captcha input to work. It never works for me from the article page.

Anyway, that post above, that's me.

No worries Travis. jQuery reminds me a lot of ColdFusion - there are numerous ways to solve the same problem.

+1 on the CAPTCHA. Next time I talk to the 'bosses' here I'll bring it up. I find it a bit hard to read too.