Progress bar -loading

[sfast]

I use google maps on my webpage using PHP which retrieves data from database and put them in a xml file and populates the data on the map.

This takes a lot of time. I wanted to have a progress circle or bar on the webpage till the map is shown.

I tried to googling and got lots of information but nothing concrete.
I am not sure if I should use Ajax or just with javascript and if I can find soemthing with php and Ajax...

I am not good with Ajax.

Can somebody guide me how should I do it?

Thanks

[ashishp]

Maybe you can put the progress bar/loading indicator in a layer that is visible by default and then use the javascript onload function to hide the layer when the page finishes loading.

HTH