Question

How does the activity indicator view work?

Can you just drag and drop this on a screen?

Answer 1

Do you mean a UIActivityIndicatorView or the status bar activity indicator?

If you want to use a UIActivityIndicatorView, create one in code or IB and control it using [activityView startAnimating] and [activityView stopAnimating]. To use the status bar activity indicator, you can show and hide it like this:

[UIApplication sharedApplication].networkActivityIndicatorVisible = YES;

// do your network stuff    

[UIApplication sharedApplication].networkActivityIndicatorVisible = NO;