animated please wait message

mattylamb · 08-12-05

on my DVD price comparison site there is sometimes a wait from someone searching to them getting the results.

I'd like to display a please wait message while the results are being collected, preferably an animated gif of some sort.

anyone know of an easy way to do this?

pricethat · 08-12-05

Im not sure about the animated please wait but that kind of wait for pricing information is quite long? are your database records indexed properly?

Was just a thought that if the database was indexed properly with a proper structure you really wouldnt need to have this wait message?

How many records are you talking about 250,000?

"edit..... It seems the server must of been slow when i posted this, its a lot faster now:::OOPS"

mattylamb · 08-12-05

the problem is that the feed is held on another sites servers. my script calls a function on the partner sites server and brings back the results - the database therefore isnt local so the delay is down to that.

eskimo · 08-12-05

You could try some javascipt in the bodytag, something along the lines of onload = hide layer.

An alternative workaround could be to place a background image of the animated gif, which would be covered when the contents load.

Art · 08-12-05

There are many javascripts in the net that you can use.
These two for example:
http://www.dynamicdrive.com/dynamici...loadimage2.htm ,

http://www.dynamicdrive.com/dynamici...eloadimage.htm .
Hope this will be of use.

Swiss · 08-12-05

Why dont you keep a copy of the data in a local database and update it daily? Response times would be a lot quicker.

mattylamb · 08-12-05

thanks for al the reply's. I'l have a look into the options tomorrow

Swiss, yes that would be the best option, but I'm not sure if it can be done with this setup - I'll have to ask medifusion, who provide the feed if that's possible.

drivetowin · 09-12-05

Just curious why you think your site is slow - assuming its the one in your signature I've just been to it and when I click on a dvd title the prices appear pretty well instantly for me - I'd say less than two seconds and I dont think you're going to get much quicker than that.

BFG 9000 · 09-12-05

Hi Matty,

I asked them the same thing a while ago, & they didn't fancy it.
If you need it as well, maybe they'll give it a go.....

Although it's entirely possible that they themselves are loading (some of the) the prices via live xml when we make the requests, so it wouldn't be possible.

With regard to your original question, that's also something I've been looking at.
What I've been trying to do, is float a <div> over the page which shows "Loading Results......" or some such, then you have a javascript function which sets the visibility of that <div> to hidden.
Call the function from <body onload=hidediv>.
....At least that's the theory, I can't quite get it working yet.

TTFN

BFG

BFG 9000 · 09-12-05

Quote:

Originally Posted by kbudden

Just curious why you think your site is slow - assuming its the one in your signature I've just been to it and when I click on a dvd title the prices appear pretty well instantly for me - I'd say less than two seconds and I dont think you're going to get much quicker than that.

If you do a search & then choose a fairly obscure result you'll see the problem.
I guess the delay is when you request data for something that was cached longer ago than the timeout of the cache.

TTFN

BFG

eskimo · 09-12-05

I have done a dissapearing loading logo on a previous site using dreameaver. I've sent a pm with the url in it.