Display a control (zoom bar) outside map container in Leaflet?

Question

I need to extend a zoom control so that it is functional outside of the leaflet map container. Can this be done?

Essentially,the same idea as what is accomplished with this item here but under the leaflet context and not openlayers. How to display a control (zoom bar) outside map container in openlayers?

Thanks,

Answer 1

At first, I thought it was something easy to do, but eventually I've lost almost half a day to come up with a solution.

The first version didn't seemed to have a practical use (only proved it is possible),

but it paved the way for the second solution, that may constitute a basis for interesting future developments.

The map can be panned, clicked and the zoom control is working properly. Tested only on Chrome, Firefox, Opera and Internet Explorer 11.