title: show loading image while loading google map
body: <p>I'm using Google Maps Javascript API for showing a map in my site with aditional markers. This is the trigger</p>
  
  <pre><code>var map = new google.maps.Map(document.getElementById("map_canvas"), settings);
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>This works fine, but the map takes a few seconds to show. I'm putting a loading image in the map div like this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>&lt;div id="map_canvas" style="width:700px; height:500px"&gt;&lt;img src="/image/ajax-loader.gif" /&gt;&lt;/div&gt;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But the image never shows, just the blank page until the map shows. </p>
  
  <p>The image is working, because if I disable the map loading function, the image is there. 
  So I think the google map clears the div before the map is loaded. </p>
  
  <p>Any ideas how to show a loading feedback to the user while waiting? I could not find a function in the API...</p>