Question

See http://jsfiddle.net/cgWdF/3/

Works fine in every browser*, except the latest Opera.

*Haven’t tested below IE9

Should have specified, It needs to return true or false, I’m not using it to bind an event.

Answer 1

jQuery’s .hover works in Opera 12.

var $sample = $("#sample");
$sample.hover(function() {
   $sample.css("background", "yellow");
}, function() {
    $sample.css("background", "");
});

Fiddle

Or, using .data to store the hovered status and test against it (similar to your original fiddle):

var $sample = $("#sample");
$sample.hover(function() {
   $(this).data('hovering', true);
}, function() {
   $(this).data('hovering', false);
});

setInterval(function(){
    var $sample = $("#sample");
    if($sample.data('hovering')) {
       $sample.css("background", "yellow");
    }
    else {
       $sample.css("background", "");
    }
}, 200);

Fiddle