Having your Web App Cake and Eating it Too
November 30th, 2006
For many of us being offline is becoming a thing of the past. We’re connected to the Network at home and at work, and everywhere in between with cellphones, blackberries, and car navigation systems. The Web is so pervasive that some of today’s teenagers don’t even know what it’s like to be without it, let alone offline for long periods of time.
Still, when we use today’s web apps, there is a clear distinction between online and off. If we aren’t online, we simply can’t use them. Our data resides on a web server (not our own machine) and the only way to access it is to actually communicate with the server in real time. To do that, we must be online.
Things are changing, however, albeit slowly. David Malouf, who is co-presenting a full-day seminar: Designing Powerful Web Applications using AJAX and RIAs at our upcoming Web App Summit, pointed me to a recent demonstration of a web app that promises to let us do just that: have our cake and eat it, too.
The application is a web-based office product called Zimbra. It includes a web-based email client, just like we’re used to with Yahoo Mail, Gmail, or Hotmail, but it also gives you the ability to work offline. From a recent blog post demonstrating that ability:
“The design goal is to have the same user experience with Zimbra both online and offline. Technically the Zimbra Offline client is the same AJAX client UI but now connecting to a local sync’d cache of the data and more importantly the ability to search, tag, organize, etc without network access. The two way sync of mail, calendar, contacts, and documents will allow Zimbra user’s to take their collaboration data together with the Zimbra AJAX experience with them on the road or in places without a network connection and when they come back online - all of the changes made while offline (like composing, deleting, moving, creating messages, contacts, events or folders) are sync’d back to the cloud. Just like traditional offline mail clients - messages pending to be sent are stored in an Outbox where you can edit and view them until re-connected.”
That’s quite a design goal, to make the online/offline distinction disappear! But it’s a vision of the future, (and I’m going out on a limb on this one 
) this will certainly be a feature built into many more web apps in months to come.
December 1st, 2006 at 4:05 am
I believe Scribe (http://iscrybe.com) has offline functionality as well. At least thats what they say in their introduction video. Since its not operational yet, can’t say that it actually works
December 2nd, 2006 at 7:51 am
Thanks for the pointer, grmlock. That’s an amazing demo! I hope the product is as good…
December 3rd, 2006 at 6:46 am
yes, and i think computers will become smaller.. one day pda will be as powerful as a laptop running web2.0 programs. we will then worry about pda interface design.
December 9th, 2006 at 7:04 am
Do you think people are becoming more comfortable having their personal data on other machines? For example, there was a rumor some time back, that Google is planning a ‘back up’ system … are more and more people letting go of their data?
Just as people were once worried about not going into a bank to get their money, ATMs and Internet Banking are common applications for people.
Thoughts?
December 14th, 2006 at 8:00 am
Daniel, certainly some types of information are different than others. What I’m continually amazed at is how Google provides so much value that, although there is grumbling, people still use their services despite the obvious security ramifications of having your data stored elsewhere. For now, people still trust Google.
And you’re right, people do adjust over time. The bank example is a good one! I remember how people used to repel at the thought of doing banking online, and now it’s simply another place we have our data.
September 3rd, 2007 at 12:15 pm
Absolutely – I agree with you on your final diagnosis. This is the way of the web future – and I am quite excited at the many prospects. Zimbra is not the only application that is attempting this – there are many others, too, and I am eager to see who is going to release the best product (and the soonest.)
I think it’s a brilliant idea – one that we should have thought of already – and am really happy to see applications and programs go this way.
October 8th, 2007 at 5:39 am
I get your point but my problem with Zimbra isn’t actually about being offline or online. I think Zimbra has some issues with some browsers. I’m a FF-user and so far everything is fine between FF and Zimbra. But when one time I had to use IE7, Zimbra didn’t seem to perform well there considering that Zimbra doesn’t have anywhere near as much HTML, which hurts them in IE. Will there come a time when browser-related issues for Zimbra will be addressed?