I'm currently working on a web application that gathers user input. A chunk of data that I need to prompt the user for is having a hard time fitting itself statically embedded in the page. That's when a popup dialog came to my mind, to prompt the user to select one or many out of a large list of options.
But then I started to feel as though this couldn't live anywhere else, so I'm solving this problem by simply adding another layer in the form of a dialog. And then it made me realize that I don't think I've ever seen a dialog on a website that seemed like it was a good idea. I'm not sure why, but I've never really thought that the dialog experience was a good one on the web, trying to mimic the desktop/native feel.
Any thoughts on this? Are web application dialogs frowned upon for good reason?