Offline

The Achilles heel of web applications is the network connection. Whether you're on an airplane, at a hotel without internet access, or simply have an unreliable home connection, this is a drawback for usability and adoption of web applications.

Dojo Offline, Google Gears, Adobe AIR, and other alternative solutions are emerging to allow web applications to function offline. For some applications, developing offline capability is a natural extension of the existing application workflow. For other applications, the offline options and possibilities are less obvious.

For example, consider email vs. a map application. Other than delaying the sending and receiving of new mail, the functionality of an email client can remain intact when offline. But storing an entire map database and engine locally is simply not practical, so we have to pack the highest value into limited storage space. We could have a system that stores the user's 20 most recent map searches, provides a "take this with me" option for selective offline storage, or only stores certain map layers (e.g. roads but not satellite images). It's difficult for offline apps to respond to unpredictable needs, but they can do a great job of showing a user's favorite or current information

We created Dojo Offline to simplify offline application development. We're working with Google to make Dojo Offline compatible with Google Gears through a simple and easy to use API. The Adobe AIR team engages us to enable Dojo Toolkit compatibility within AIR.