How can I give control back (briefly) to the browser during intensive JavaScript processing?
<p>I have read the post <a href="http://www.julienlecomte.net/blog/2007/10/28/">here</a> about using setTimeout() during intensive DOM processing (using JavaScript), but how can I integrate this function with the below code? The below code works fine for a small number of options, but when the number of options gets too big my "please wait" animated GIF freezes while the local JavaScript is processing. Thanks!</p>

<pre><code>function appendToSelect() {
    $("#mySelect").children().remove() ;
    $("#mySelect").html(
        '&lt;option selected value="' + obj.data[0].value + '"&gt;'
        + obj.data[0].name
        + '&lt;/option&gt;'
    );
    var j = 1 ;
    for (var i = 1; i &lt; obj.data.length; i++) {
        $("#mySelect").append(
            '&lt;option value="' + obj.data[i].value + '"&gt;'
            + obj.data[i].name
            + '&lt;/option&gt;'
        ); 
    }
}
</code></pre>
