The loading modal was a huge turnoff. Why would you ever show that to a user? After clicking a link, when is your browser not loading the next page?
I see that modal when browsing the docs (http://jquerymobile.com/demos/1.0/) in Chrome on a broadband connection ("I canna go any faster captain!"). The presence of that modal made me question other design decisions (yes, I get it, you have a sleek pop-up experience... now why are you showing it to me on every page load?).
> The loading modal was a huge turnoff. Why would you ever show that to a user?
IMO, with ajax page loads you need to show the user something that indicates their click was received. All browsers have a spinner or message somewhere to indicate "they're working" on pulling down the next page of content. If you take that visual clue away from users when loading content via ajax, what you'll end up with is frustrated users who click multiple times on the link since they think it's not working.
Whether the big obnoxious "loading" popup with ugly spinner is the right design choice is another matter, but fortunately the styling and location of that is easily changed.
I should have clarified -- it's not that a loading message is unnecessary, it's how it was implemented. The fact that a giant overlay modal appears on every page in their public docs calls into question other UI decisions. This isn't the padding on some button, it's an in your face element.
Sure, we can tweak it to have a small transparent spinner in the lower right... but what other changes are needed too? I want a framework where the authors already fixed these obvious things.
I see that modal when browsing the docs (http://jquerymobile.com/demos/1.0/) in Chrome on a broadband connection ("I canna go any faster captain!"). The presence of that modal made me question other design decisions (yes, I get it, you have a sleek pop-up experience... now why are you showing it to me on every page load?).