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> You can disguise small delays in your progress bar by moving it instant and steady (fast in the beginning and slowing it down as it.

I think having a lying progress bar is worst than a loading spinner.

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Research has shown that you should lie in the opposite way to get a better user reaction. If you artificially slow down the progress report in the beginning so that it can speed up near the end, the increasing speed works to counter the user's decreasing patience.

I argued this just the other day but couldn't find the source where I had read it. Do you happen to have a link for this research?

I don't think this paper is the source I remember. I seem to recall something from Microsoft Research. But, it reaches the same conclusion.

Article with easy summary and link to paper: http://johnnyholland.org/2008/11/the-effect-of-the-progress-...

Edit: here's a large collection of articles

https://github.com/Zhouzi/reactivedesign/blob/gh-pages/READM...

It doesn't counter decreasing patience, it sets expectation and then exceeds it instead of falling short.

What's with all the promotion of anti-patterns lately?

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