Authors:
Tim A. Majchrzak
1
and
Timo Hillmann
2
Affiliations:
1
University of Cologne, Germany
;
2
University of Münster, Germany
Keyword(s):
Offline, Storage, Synchronization, Webapp, Mobile, Mobile Webapp, Web Application, App, Mobile Computing.
Related
Ontology
Subjects/Areas/Topics:
Internet Technology
;
Mobile APIs and Services
;
Mobile Information Systems
;
Restful Web Services
;
Web Information Systems and Technologies
;
Web Interfaces and Applications
;
Web Programming
Abstract:
Despite progress in the development of cross-platform frameworks, today’s apps often are realized either as
native apps or as Webapps. The latter are easy to implement and rely on robust and future-proof technologies
such as HTML5, Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and JavaScript. However, Webapps commonly require a stable
Internet connection. Recent developments facilitate offline-enabled Webapps. If an app is able to store data
locally, it should also be enabled to synchronize with a server backend. We assess current HTML5 storage
capabilities and discuss their possibilities along with considerations of mobile computing synchronization
strategies. Our work includes the compilation of requirements that Webapps have regarding their offline
capabilities. Moreover, we discuss the status quo of offline storage and give an outlook based on a proof-of-concept
implementation.