How to use activity indicator view on iPhone?

Create:

spinner = [[UIActivityIndicatorView alloc] initWithActivityIndicatorStyle:UIActivityIndicatorViewStyleWhiteLarge];
[spinner setCenter:CGPointMake(kScreenWidth/2.0, kScreenHeight/2.0)]; // I do this because I'm in landscape mode
[self.view addSubview:spinner]; // spinner is not visible until started

Start:

[spinner startAnimating]; 

Stop:

 [spinner stopAnimating];

When you're finally done, remove the spinner from the view and release.

Take a look at the open source WordPress application. They have a very re-usable window they have created for displaying an "activity in progress" type display over top of whatever view your application is currently displaying.

http://iphone.trac.wordpress.org/browser/trunk

The files you want are:

• WPActivityIndicator.xib
• RoundedRectBlack.png
• WPActivityIndicator.h
• WPActivityIndicator.m

Then to show it use something like:

[[WPActivityIndicator sharedActivityIndicator] show];

And hide with:

[[WPActivityIndicator sharedActivityIndicator] hide];

The documentation on this is pretty clear. It's a UIView subclass so you use it like any other view. To start/stop the animation you use

[activityIndicator startAnimating];
[activityIndicator stopAnimating];