Offline Applications And Offline First Design: Challenges And Solutions

As a matter of fact, users tend to react negatively to dropped connectivity when using apps. A survey conducted by Appdynamics shows that 86% of Americans polled had removed at least one app from a device due to the unreliable app’s performance. Does the offline-first approach stand a chance to partially address the issue? 

In this article we will look primarily at offline first apps and refer to the others for contrast. Besides, you’ll explore what pain points offline first apps address and figure it out whether your app is actually optimized for operating offline. 

What Are Offline Applications?

To begin with, though, let’s look further into the types of apps:

Offline apps are applications that can function without an internet connection. 

Offline apps store data locally on the device and sync with online servers when connectivity is available. 

The apps that handle photo editing functions are good examples of offline applications. Even if cell service is never restored, the camera functions, the images are still in place, any editing by the app will still be available, and you can even plug a cable into the device or connect to a local network to transfer images to other machines.  

Common Functions Of Offline Applications

Typical functions handled by offline applications can include things such as:

• Data recording or manipulation, like making lists, counting steps, or calculating. 
• Content consumption, like watching videos or reading books or maps downloaded via another app such as an e-commerce app or uploaded from a local server.
• Productivity assistance, like using functionality provided by Microsoft Office Suite. 
• Providing local notifications.

Offline apps can use the sensors built into the device, but they usually have everything they need built in. For example, a star-gazing app will come preloaded with the data related to the stars, and use sensors in the phone to determine your location and which direction you’re facing.

What Are Offline First Applications?

Offline first apps are apps that have lots of core functions available offline, but still need an internet connection on a temporary or occasional basis.  

Unlike a simple list app that can share data online or via Bluetooth, offline-first apps are designed with offline communication as a key feature, not just an option.

Common Functions Of Offline First Mobile Apps

Offline apps typically do certain types of things. With them, you do things offline, and secondary functions might or might not have online components. These primary functions can include:

• File and media access
• Data caching and storage
• Lightweight UI interactions
• Local authentication 
• Push notifications management

What Are Offline Mode Mobile Apps

Offline-mode apps or apps with online mode are online apps that rely on the internet connection to handle most of their functions but support a number of offline actions. 

Payment apps are usually an example of offline-mode mobile apps. While a developer would be wise to take an offline first approach to designing the payment app, the functionality of the app itself would be impaired by the lack of internet access.

Retailer loyalty cards might offer full capabilities without connecting beyond a local intranet, and would be considered offline first. However, banking apps that only let you see your payment history when offline are not offline first, because you cannot make payments until the connection is restored.

Common Functions Of Offline Mode Mobile Apps

Offline-mode apps typically do certain types of things. With them, you often do things such as:

• Geolocating, which involves cellular signals as well as GPS for precision
• Media playback and content viewing
• Local data storage
• Push notifications management
• Offline search and filtering

Apps with a robust offline mode let the user continue in a limited way until connectivity is restored.

The summarizing table including offline apps, offline-first apps, and offline mode apps is provided in the table below:

Why Is An Offline First Approach Important?

Whether you have an offline application that fully works without an Internet connection or not, taking an offline first approach is an important design decision. By keeping as much functionality and data on the phone as possible, you gain several advantages:

Reduced Network Load

Reducing network load is one way of ensuring a better user experience. Network bandwidth is not unlimited, and if enough users are on, the resulting congestion slows down the network. Poorly designed apps play a large part in clogging up networks and slowing them down. By taking an offline first approach whenever possible, the network is faster for all.

Operation Is Not Disrupted When The Network Drops

Network access breaks occur for many reasons, and reducing your app’s dependence on access can result in your app working when others don’t, or, if the break is short, such as during a network hand-off, the change might not be noticed at all.

Increased Speed of Data-Intensive Apps

When an app built under an offline first approach performs a function, if that function can be performed on-device, it will be faster than one that must access a server. The user might not notice the speed of the offline first app, but the slower speed of the other will register if slow enough. That’s true for data-intensive apps, mostly, since lightweight apps, show nearly the same speed regardless of internet connection after a certain threshold. 

Availability Across Locations

As a matter of fact, 2.6 billion people still don’t have internet access. At the same time, many people who normally have internet access may relocate or temporarily travel where internet access is absent. It means that at leasty one third of all people in the world still have to prioritize offline-first applications over online apps, to have functional software at hands. 

Types of Network Connectivity Issues That Affect Apps

Your first thought might be that the main problem is whether Internet access is available or not. The situation is more complicated than that. The issues include:

Low Signal Strength

Even when the network is not congested, low signal strength can affect connectivity. Even if the network and the device can contact each other, data transmission can be affected, resulting in more repeats, and the possibility of intermittent connections. The more the app can do on-device, the less this is a factor.

Intermittent Connection

Intermittent connections can play havoc on updates in particular, and if an app is not robust enough to handle frequent data transfer interruptions, performance will suffer. If the intermittent connection occurs often enough, the connection will drop completely. 

No Connection

There are still plenty of no-coverage spots, and network outages do occur. The more an app can do on-device, the better the user experience will be.

What Are Some Challenges And Solutions To Building Offline Apps?

While an offline first approach can help offline-mode apps be more robust, there is every reason to keep this approach in mind when building an offline first application. The performance trade-off that offline-mode apps suffer with is greatly reduced, if not eliminated.

• Fault tolerance
• Staying synchronized is vital for financial / payment apps
• How devices are updated
• Ensuring seamless experiences
• Where is the data stored
• Alerting the user when offline

Fault Tolerance

Challenge: Building an app that continues operation when the network connection is weak, intermittent or dropped

Solution: For offline first apps, minimizing connectivity needs in the first place should be easy. Ensure that servers are not needed for important functions, or you might find yourself with an offline-mode app in the end. 

You can read the DashDevs blog post on High-Availability and Fault Tolerance in Fintech Apps for more information.  

Staying Synchronized 

Challenge: Ensuring that both the off-device servers and the app have the same data. 

Solution: Choose in the app architecture how synching is handled and which is the “source of truth” within the app. Though offline first apps do not need connectivity to perform their most important functions, making sure that synchronization does not affect the rest of the app is important. 

Microservices can play a role here, so read the DashDevs Node.Js And Microservices: Unlocking Scalability And Flexibility In Fintech post to learn more.

How Devices Are Updated

Challenge: When the device comes online, what updates are required on the server end and on the device end, and how is this done?

Solution: Updating the database for offline application synching can be tricky 

Ensuring Seamless Experiences

Challenge: While offline first apps will have few or no issues with connectivity, apps utilizing offline mode will need to ensure that the user experience, though degraded, is still useful, and that moving between online and offline modes is no more disruptive than necessary.

Solution: To ensure the most seamless experience possible with an app that has an offline mode, consider keeping as much content consumption and initial data storage on the device as possible. Synch with the outside world only when signal quality is strong enough and, if possible, when the network load is low.

Where The Data Is Stored

Challenge: Storage on a mobile device is relatively limited. How the data for an offline first app be stored?

Solution: Light databases such as MongoDB are popular for storing unstructured data, and do not take up much room. 

Alerting The User When Offline

Challenge: Many offline first apps still use Internet connectivity for updating information such as high scores, sending photos or downloading videos. Knowing the application mode and that the device is offline is still important. 

Solution: Since an offline app doesn’t need an Internet connection for its core functions, a discrete banner or radio button indicating that there is no Internet connection should suffice. For some apps, such as calculator apps, no notification is necessary.  

Marvel International Tobacco Group

At DashDevs, we have delivered over 500 business solutions in our time. One project that focused heavily on an offline-first approach was the survey application for Marvel International Tobacco Group. Collecting data was hindered by their sales representatives’ need to go to areas where Internet connectivity could become marginal or non-existent, Marvel came to us to deliver a survey app that allowed the sales representative to conduct surveys offline by default. and track their location during work hours. 

At mid-day and at the end of the day, the app would go onto an available network and upload survey results as well as a map of where the sales representative had been. This combination of offline and online modes gave Marvel the flexibility they needed to better understand their customers.

Final Take

Taking an offline first approach can improve performance and smoother the user experience. Because an offline first approach increases storage and processor loads, care is needed at the design stage to optimize for these factors. If done right, though, the result is higher user satisfaction.  

DashDevs has over 13 years of experience on the market and has delivered 500+ solutions to businesses. Our specialization and experience enable us to develop offline first and offline-mode apps of any complexity for companies from a variety of industries. Don’t hesitate to request our assistance should you need a trusted provider.

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