This would show the last known table schema and data that was shown, but would allow to make records and sync when the mobile device comes back online. Issues would be resolved via the web to validate issues.
+1I’ve worked in IT for 45 years (yes - 45 years! www.roysheridan.com) and Airtable is one of the most elegant and well-thought-through applications I have ever come across. It’s a joy to use, which makes the lack of offline capability only more frustrating, as witnessed by the volume of contributions to this thread. I also understand the challenges of conflict resolution. Which is why the problem needs to be segmented…
The majority of contributors use Airtable solo and would be happy with read-only. Therefore, Howie and Katharine, you should address this segment first and as a priority, thus satisfying the 80:20 rule. A more sophisticated solution can follow. Currently, no-one is happy and - believe me - you are losing business.
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
I have implemented a system for managing all aspects of a small vacation rental property business and it has made my life (and my accountant’s!) a lot easier. I would like to have a system for managing all my contacts and to-dos as I have yet to find an integrated system that does a good enough job (Apple’s products are pathetic in this area). But I would have to have offline access (e.g. when travelling).
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
Alone
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
I would prefer to be able to update, but read-only will do. Don’t need to change structure.
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
Single-user with no structural changes should not create any conflicts!
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
Both.
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
I travel to remote places all over the world. I would use offline Airtable on a mobile device and on a laptop. Much project information is needed to be shared back with my associates.
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
While there might be many users who would read Airtable data (either online or offline), probably no more than 5 or 10 would actually edit data, and only 1 or 2 would actually change the schema (though very unlikely to edit schema offline).
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
- Read the data frequently.
- Edit the data occasionally. However, I would be willing to forego editing in offline mode, if I could make notes on a record so that I could edit later when online. I would want some way to easily see a list of all notes made offline so I could do the edits later online. [This could be another table “Comments” with the fields “Table” for the table needing the edit, “Field” for the field needing edits, “Change” for what you intend to change, and “Completed” for marking that you’ve done it. You could probably get fancy and automatically create a link from the “Table” and “Field” fields back to the place the user intends to update.]
- Add records frequently. It seems that I should be able to add a new record off-line without disturbing the base. (Granted there may be some trigger issues… but I think you could treat this as a record added when a user is back online)
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
Willing to do this if necessary. However, the notes feature above relieves both Airtable and myself from much of the problem.
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
Both
+2I need off-line access, as I’m at the point where I’m going to need to use another solution. I’m often in areas with no internet connection, and I’m trying to get adoption from colleagues, but they too are in places where they’re off-line, and it is frustrating to have spent 30 minutes updating to discover that most of the changes have not been saved. Build into the software they need to have a timed token of offline use (say seven days), and then after that, they need to go online.
Katherine_Duh wrote:
Hi, everyone! First off, we hear you loud and clear on the desire for offline mode. We’ve spent much time internally exploring the possibility of offline mode (and even building some prototypes), but it’s a fundamentally difficult feature to build. Since Airtable is a collaborative product, an ideal offline solution would need to gracefully handle merge conflicts, and do so in the context of Airtable’s relational data structure and rich field types. For comparison, Google Docs uses an approach termed operational transforms, but this only works on simpler data structures (i.e. a Google word document is represented as a single long string of text, and a spreadsheet is represented as a shapeless 2-dimensional array of cells).
As we continue to explore the tradeoffs for various implementations of offline mode, it would be very useful for our team to get some detailed feedback from dedicated Airtable users like yourselves about why and how you would like offline to be designed. Just a sampling of potential things to think about:
- How would you want to use Airtable offline? Tell us your story. Are you a world traveler, wanting to find a way to look at your elaborately designed base of sightseeing spots without having to pay exorbitant roaming charges? Are you a construction baron, sending out remote workers to to survey your newly acquired plots of land? Are you a deep sea diver on a solo expedition in the Marianas Trench, logging undiscovered species of hagfish on the ocean floor? Do you just have really terrible WiFi in the boiler room under the stairs, where the boss moved your office?
- Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators? (Resolving merge conflicts when someone is the sole collaborator on a database is far simpler than doing so when you have multiple collaborators, some of whom are online and some of whom are offline, and all of whom are editing different things.)
- How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline? Do you just need a read-only version of the contents of your bases that you can access while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to edit the contents of records while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to change the database schemata while offline? (In order, these are: comparatively simple to implement; difficult to implement; incredibly difficult to implement.)
- For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline? For a few minutes, as you drive through a tunnel? (Please don’t Airtable and drive.) For a few hours, as you sit in an airport terminal and refuse to pay for overpriced WiFi? For a few weeks, as you trek through the farthest reaches of frigid Nunavut?
- How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually? One potential way of alleviating the issues that arise with resolving merge conflicts is to force end users to make decisions on how to solve specific conflicts. This, however, comes with its own set of potential problems (e.g. being stalled by having to resolve a merge conflict when all you want to do is work, your co-workers getting mad that you merged over their data without their permission).
- Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile? Anecdotally, it seems like many of the people who want offline mode want it for mobile, but it would be good for us to get some clarification on that front.
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
I’m a Parish administrator at a large urban church. I’m using airtables as our main database and directory of Parishioners. For it to be usable for the Priest when she is traveling around to see people, she needs to be able to read and search records for phone number/address etc while offline. All of the editing and merge features would be great, but we could get by with just being able to view and search the last saved copy.
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
I’m the sole editor but other people are able to view the bases or certain views in the bases and need to be able to view while offline.
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
I need to be able to read and search the bases. Editing would be nice but isn’t mandatory for usability.
For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline?
Ideally being able to see the bases offline for up to a month without wifi would be great, I think all of the users connect to wifi daily or nearly daily so if it was only daily that would probably also work.
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
It would be fine because I’m the only one editing most of the time.
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
Mobile
I just found Airtable and after looking around at other options, I REALLLY want to implement this for our business.
We work on an aircraft and we need contact information for 1000’s of numbers across Canada to communicate within our company and others. We currently use a brutal microsoft access database that is such a pain, and requires a laptop to work. Airtable is THE PERFECT solution if it had a read-only access mode through the iOS apps. PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE implement this feature or someone reading this please show me an app with the functionality of airtable that has offline capabilities.
I should point out that offline access is potentially even more important on non-mobile devices. The main situation I run into a lot is being on a flight and needing to update some bases but being unable to.
A solution is to use a cached offline database, so all modifications are made offline and later synced with the cloud. This is Afaik also how it works with Trello, Evernote etc.
Another idea is to cache the changed DOM elements on the client and sync them later with the cloud/database. This could work with using json to serialize the data and write them to a file.
Because this is a very often used feature by a lot of apps, I think some researching will show different/easier solutions for this offline caching of data on Android/iOS.
I think this offline caching is only important on mobile devices, where the chance is big that you have no internet connection. So it needs only implemented in the Android/iOS apps.
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
i work with colleagues who track diseases. We use a database that is used in all sorts of configurations based on the disease. In some situations we have server-client-web model where lots of people enter and update data through a browser to a database in the cloud. But in some situations, there is no coverage and no network. Maybe it’s for days, maybe just hours. But data are entered while offline and then synchronized when back on the grid. This is typically done by running a client on a laptop or tablet with all data stored locally. When you have 5 people working on a single database, synchronizing them can be quite challenging. For example, person 1 gets back in signal on Mondays, person 2 on Tuesdays, etc. They all have to push and pull and resolve conflicts. Typically they don’t work on each others records, but it happens sometimes.
To add to this, I sometimes have a data manager who is working on quality issues related to all the workers data. So being able to edit and track versions is important. (eg, someone entered a symptoms date in the future)
So I would want to read, add, and edit records offline.
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
Usually with collaborators.
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
Read and search. Make adds and limited edits.
For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline?
As long as my local device has memory and disk. Typically only a few days, but could last for long periods of time.
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
This is fine.
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
Desktop, but willing to switch to mobile if it helps.
I REALLY hope I am wrong, but seeing the lack of answers from Airtable’s employees on this topic makes me wonder if they care about addressing offline mode at all.
Probably more a business model decision than a technical one I suspect.
Still, it’s VERY unfortunate. And again, I really hope I’m wrong here.
Thank you Airtable for this fabulous software you’re bringing to us. Please make it even better. Would gladly subscribe for a pro plan with offline mode !
Cheers
+2Keeping an eye on Notion.so. Tables have been added and while not as robust as Airtable currently, it is a one stop app for Notes, Tasks, Projects, and Tables. I post this only to say it has offline mode abilities but they are limited. Airtable, please add an offline mode soon.
I am in Mexico and Internet coverage via my cell phone is spotty. Sometimes I need to access the information while not having Internet access and I have to return to my Excel tables.
Many apps have an offline mode and bases sync when Internet access returns.
Hope we get this soon.
Katherine_Duh wrote:
Hi, everyone! First off, we hear you loud and clear on the desire for offline mode. We’ve spent much time internally exploring the possibility of offline mode (and even building some prototypes), but it’s a fundamentally difficult feature to build. Since Airtable is a collaborative product, an ideal offline solution would need to gracefully handle merge conflicts, and do so in the context of Airtable’s relational data structure and rich field types. For comparison, Google Docs uses an approach termed operational transforms, but this only works on simpler data structures (i.e. a Google word document is represented as a single long string of text, and a spreadsheet is represented as a shapeless 2-dimensional array of cells).
As we continue to explore the tradeoffs for various implementations of offline mode, it would be very useful for our team to get some detailed feedback from dedicated Airtable users like yourselves about why and how you would like offline to be designed. Just a sampling of potential things to think about:
- How would you want to use Airtable offline? Tell us your story. Are you a world traveler, wanting to find a way to look at your elaborately designed base of sightseeing spots without having to pay exorbitant roaming charges? Are you a construction baron, sending out remote workers to to survey your newly acquired plots of land? Are you a deep sea diver on a solo expedition in the Marianas Trench, logging undiscovered species of hagfish on the ocean floor? Do you just have really terrible WiFi in the boiler room under the stairs, where the boss moved your office?
- Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators? (Resolving merge conflicts when someone is the sole collaborator on a database is far simpler than doing so when you have multiple collaborators, some of whom are online and some of whom are offline, and all of whom are editing different things.)
- How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline? Do you just need a read-only version of the contents of your bases that you can access while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to edit the contents of records while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to change the database schemata while offline? (In order, these are: comparatively simple to implement; difficult to implement; incredibly difficult to implement.)
- For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline? For a few minutes, as you drive through a tunnel? (Please don’t Airtable and drive.) For a few hours, as you sit in an airport terminal and refuse to pay for overpriced WiFi? For a few weeks, as you trek through the farthest reaches of frigid Nunavut?
- How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually? One potential way of alleviating the issues that arise with resolving merge conflicts is to force end users to make decisions on how to solve specific conflicts. This, however, comes with its own set of potential problems (e.g. being stalled by having to resolve a merge conflict when all you want to do is work, your co-workers getting mad that you merged over their data without their permission).
- Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile? Anecdotally, it seems like many of the people who want offline mode want it for mobile, but it would be good for us to get some clarification on that front.
I travel extensively. I need to be able to use either on my laptop or a tablet while I’m on a flight for 3 - 18 hours. I prefer using on a laptop than a tablet. I could live with manual merge conflict resolution - but my needs are quite simple without a lot of records or colaborators.
#1 - Read only version offline - Quite Important
#2 - Edit contents offline - Would be really nice to have that
#3 - Edit schemata - Not really needed
Joining the cry for offline database access.
I’m a solo user, running on Windows (laptop). I don’t care about mobile access, or collaboration.
I would pay money for a good app, but I live in a rural location with satellite internet which goes out from time to time with some regularity.
I can’t even save a local file manually. How can I possibly rely upon this for a reference database when I can’t count on being able to even refer to a local file? How would I backup it up locally, or add it to my Dropbox cache? How can I ensure that the file(s) will survive, after pouring a lot of database effort into the content? By periodic CSV dumps? Puh-lease…
I don’t invest my time and data into products I can’t backup and run offline. That’s crazy.
This is pretty much a showstopper for me. And there doesn’t seem to be any answer about a future path forward from Airtable folks. Solve this for the local single-user crowd – how hard can that be?
Katherine_Duh wrote:
Hi, everyone! First off, we hear you loud and clear on the desire for offline mode. We’ve spent much time internally exploring the possibility of offline mode (and even building some prototypes), but it’s a fundamentally difficult feature to build. Since Airtable is a collaborative product, an ideal offline solution would need to gracefully handle merge conflicts, and do so in the context of Airtable’s relational data structure and rich field types. For comparison, Google Docs uses an approach termed operational transforms, but this only works on simpler data structures (i.e. a Google word document is represented as a single long string of text, and a spreadsheet is represented as a shapeless 2-dimensional array of cells).
As we continue to explore the tradeoffs for various implementations of offline mode, it would be very useful for our team to get some detailed feedback from dedicated Airtable users like yourselves about why and how you would like offline to be designed. Just a sampling of potential things to think about:
- How would you want to use Airtable offline? Tell us your story. Are you a world traveler, wanting to find a way to look at your elaborately designed base of sightseeing spots without having to pay exorbitant roaming charges? Are you a construction baron, sending out remote workers to to survey your newly acquired plots of land? Are you a deep sea diver on a solo expedition in the Marianas Trench, logging undiscovered species of hagfish on the ocean floor? Do you just have really terrible WiFi in the boiler room under the stairs, where the boss moved your office?
- Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators? (Resolving merge conflicts when someone is the sole collaborator on a database is far simpler than doing so when you have multiple collaborators, some of whom are online and some of whom are offline, and all of whom are editing different things.)
- How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline? Do you just need a read-only version of the contents of your bases that you can access while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to edit the contents of records while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to change the database schemata while offline? (In order, these are: comparatively simple to implement; difficult to implement; incredibly difficult to implement.)
- For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline? For a few minutes, as you drive through a tunnel? (Please don’t Airtable and drive.) For a few hours, as you sit in an airport terminal and refuse to pay for overpriced WiFi? For a few weeks, as you trek through the farthest reaches of frigid Nunavut?
- How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually? One potential way of alleviating the issues that arise with resolving merge conflicts is to force end users to make decisions on how to solve specific conflicts. This, however, comes with its own set of potential problems (e.g. being stalled by having to resolve a merge conflict when all you want to do is work, your co-workers getting mad that you merged over their data without their permission).
- Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile? Anecdotally, it seems like many of the people who want offline mode want it for mobile, but it would be good for us to get some clarification on that front.
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
Using it to check things whilst I’m out and about instead of having to use my computer, I don’t really have to change anything most of the time, it’s more of an issue of it taking a long time to load sometimes so it would be helpful if the data was stored on my phone so it loaded quicker with shitty coverage.
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
With collaborators
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
Read-only would be fine.
For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline?
as long as possible.
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
I don’t see this as an issue, just don’t allow edits to be made in offline mode.
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
mobile
Karen_Myers wrote:
Joining the cry for offline database access.
I’m a solo user, running on Windows (laptop). I don’t care about mobile access, or collaboration.
I would pay money for a good app, but I live in a rural location with satellite internet which goes out from time to time with some regularity.
I can’t even save a local file manually. How can I possibly rely upon this for a reference database when I can’t count on being able to even refer to a local file? How would I backup it up locally, or add it to my Dropbox cache? How can I ensure that the file(s) will survive, after pouring a lot of database effort into the content? By periodic CSV dumps? Puh-lease…
I don’t invest my time and data into products I can’t backup and run offline. That’s crazy.
This is pretty much a showstopper for me. And there doesn’t seem to be any answer about a future path forward from Airtable folks. Solve this for the local single-user crowd – how hard can that be?
Hi all,
I am in exact same position as many.
I travel a lot and also live in a rural area with poor internet so must have some offline access…yep a deal breaker for me too.
I have the Mac app and when I tried to open it offline…nothing won’t bring up anything.
The Airtable Mac OS app can’t open anything while offline.
Hope the Airtable team are listening and get onto an offline solution, until then it’s not going to work for me sadly.
Regards,
Scott
Katherine_Duh wrote:
Hi, everyone! First off, we hear you loud and clear on the desire for offline mode. We’ve spent much time internally exploring the possibility of offline mode (and even building some prototypes), but it’s a fundamentally difficult feature to build. Since Airtable is a collaborative product, an ideal offline solution would need to gracefully handle merge conflicts, and do so in the context of Airtable’s relational data structure and rich field types. For comparison, Google Docs uses an approach termed operational transforms, but this only works on simpler data structures (i.e. a Google word document is represented as a single long string of text, and a spreadsheet is represented as a shapeless 2-dimensional array of cells).
As we continue to explore the tradeoffs for various implementations of offline mode, it would be very useful for our team to get some detailed feedback from dedicated Airtable users like yourselves about why and how you would like offline to be designed. Just a sampling of potential things to think about:
- How would you want to use Airtable offline? Tell us your story. Are you a world traveler, wanting to find a way to look at your elaborately designed base of sightseeing spots without having to pay exorbitant roaming charges? Are you a construction baron, sending out remote workers to to survey your newly acquired plots of land? Are you a deep sea diver on a solo expedition in the Marianas Trench, logging undiscovered species of hagfish on the ocean floor? Do you just have really terrible WiFi in the boiler room under the stairs, where the boss moved your office?
- Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators? (Resolving merge conflicts when someone is the sole collaborator on a database is far simpler than doing so when you have multiple collaborators, some of whom are online and some of whom are offline, and all of whom are editing different things.)
- How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline? Do you just need a read-only version of the contents of your bases that you can access while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to edit the contents of records while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to change the database schemata while offline? (In order, these are: comparatively simple to implement; difficult to implement; incredibly difficult to implement.)
- For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline? For a few minutes, as you drive through a tunnel? (Please don’t Airtable and drive.) For a few hours, as you sit in an airport terminal and refuse to pay for overpriced WiFi? For a few weeks, as you trek through the farthest reaches of frigid Nunavut?
- How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually? One potential way of alleviating the issues that arise with resolving merge conflicts is to force end users to make decisions on how to solve specific conflicts. This, however, comes with its own set of potential problems (e.g. being stalled by having to resolve a merge conflict when all you want to do is work, your co-workers getting mad that you merged over their data without their permission).
- Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile? Anecdotally, it seems like many of the people who want offline mode want it for mobile, but it would be good for us to get some clarification on that front.
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
I have field technicians that would need to enter data while at some pretty remote construction job sites. I would need them to be able to create new records in a table, scan barcodes into Barcode fields, and add photos to Attachment fields
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
Both
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
Minimally, the ability to create new records and fill in fields of all types would satisfy me.
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
Not terribly tolerant. I have 40-50 field technicians. It’s not likely that many of them would be attempting to merge offline data at the same time, but if the possibility exists, it’s best to avoid it. I shudder at the thought of having to resolve a web of conflicts. If offline work were limited to the creation of new records, I think conflicts would be fairly minimal.
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
Mobile - my field technicians would be using mobile phones to scan barcodes and take photos.
I am so disappointed! I only recently downloaded Airtable and I love it, and I spent a good number of hours creating a base for a project I’ve been working on. Then I opened it up to work on a train, and I found out there is no offline mode! It didn’t even occur to me that this feature wouldn’t be available because it seems like such a no-brainer, or else I wouldn’t have even started using it in the first place. What a waste of time that will have been if there is no offline mode, because there is no way I will use this product without the ability to work offline :frowning: which is too bad because I really like it!
-
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
I want to be able to work with my databases even when I don’t have internet access—for example, when traveling on planes and trains where there is no internet, or working in any place with weak internet access/no internet access. I use Airtable to keep track of legal research, I basically treat it like a spreadsheet in a lot of ways. I want to be able to update and add to my work even if I’m in a place without internet. -
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
Alone -
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
Everything. I want to make edits to my bases, as much as I want, and then have it sync next time I’m online. Similar to the user experience when editing documents in OneDrive—I work with the document in offline mode, then save it and continue to access the saved updated version for as long as I’m offline, and it syncs next time I have internet without much if any intervention from me. -
For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline?
as long as possible. -
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
Not very. -
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
Desktop
Having the ability to work offline is an essential must have. Please Airtable guys. I’ll be the first to upgrade to paid when you do.
I had the exact same experience as one of the previous posters-- spent an hour or two using Airtable to set up a database for a project. Useful right from the start- a simple an elegant solution to something I would have otherwise used a spreadsheet app on the laptop for. Except I was working on my iPad, which was very cool.
Then got on my flight and stared with dismay at a blank screen.
Katherine_Duh wrote:
Hi, everyone! First off, we hear you loud and clear on the desire for offline mode. We’ve spent much time internally exploring the possibility of offline mode (and even building some prototypes), but it’s a fundamentally difficult feature to build. Since Airtable is a collaborative product, an ideal offline solution would need to gracefully handle merge conflicts, and do so in the context of Airtable’s relational data structure and rich field types. For comparison, Google Docs uses an approach termed operational transforms, but this only works on simpler data structures (i.e. a Google word document is represented as a single long string of text, and a spreadsheet is represented as a shapeless 2-dimensional array of cells).
As we continue to explore the tradeoffs for various implementations of offline mode, it would be very useful for our team to get some detailed feedback from dedicated Airtable users like yourselves about why and how you would like offline to be designed. Just a sampling of potential things to think about:
- How would you want to use Airtable offline? Tell us your story. Are you a world traveler, wanting to find a way to look at your elaborately designed base of sightseeing spots without having to pay exorbitant roaming charges? Are you a construction baron, sending out remote workers to to survey your newly acquired plots of land? Are you a deep sea diver on a solo expedition in the Marianas Trench, logging undiscovered species of hagfish on the ocean floor? Do you just have really terrible WiFi in the boiler room under the stairs, where the boss moved your office?
- Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators? (Resolving merge conflicts when someone is the sole collaborator on a database is far simpler than doing so when you have multiple collaborators, some of whom are online and some of whom are offline, and all of whom are editing different things.)
- How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline? Do you just need a read-only version of the contents of your bases that you can access while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to edit the contents of records while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to change the database schemata while offline? (In order, these are: comparatively simple to implement; difficult to implement; incredibly difficult to implement.)
- For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline? For a few minutes, as you drive through a tunnel? (Please don’t Airtable and drive.) For a few hours, as you sit in an airport terminal and refuse to pay for overpriced WiFi? For a few weeks, as you trek through the farthest reaches of frigid Nunavut?
- How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually? One potential way of alleviating the issues that arise with resolving merge conflicts is to force end users to make decisions on how to solve specific conflicts. This, however, comes with its own set of potential problems (e.g. being stalled by having to resolve a merge conflict when all you want to do is work, your co-workers getting mad that you merged over their data without their permission).
- Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile? Anecdotally, it seems like many of the people who want offline mode want it for mobile, but it would be good for us to get some clarification on that front.
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
In all of the normal ways - reading and editing existing bases, adding new bases.
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
Alone, but possibly with a small number of collaborators in the future
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
Ideally everything, but editing, adding and deleting records in existing tables at a minimum
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
Reasonably tolerant
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
Mostly mobile for offline
+5Katherine_Duh wrote:
Hi, everyone! First off, we hear you loud and clear on the desire for offline mode. We’ve spent much time internally exploring the possibility of offline mode (and even building some prototypes), but it’s a fundamentally difficult feature to build. Since Airtable is a collaborative product, an ideal offline solution would need to gracefully handle merge conflicts, and do so in the context of Airtable’s relational data structure and rich field types. For comparison, Google Docs uses an approach termed operational transforms, but this only works on simpler data structures (i.e. a Google word document is represented as a single long string of text, and a spreadsheet is represented as a shapeless 2-dimensional array of cells).
As we continue to explore the tradeoffs for various implementations of offline mode, it would be very useful for our team to get some detailed feedback from dedicated Airtable users like yourselves about why and how you would like offline to be designed. Just a sampling of potential things to think about:
- How would you want to use Airtable offline? Tell us your story. Are you a world traveler, wanting to find a way to look at your elaborately designed base of sightseeing spots without having to pay exorbitant roaming charges? Are you a construction baron, sending out remote workers to to survey your newly acquired plots of land? Are you a deep sea diver on a solo expedition in the Marianas Trench, logging undiscovered species of hagfish on the ocean floor? Do you just have really terrible WiFi in the boiler room under the stairs, where the boss moved your office?
- Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators? (Resolving merge conflicts when someone is the sole collaborator on a database is far simpler than doing so when you have multiple collaborators, some of whom are online and some of whom are offline, and all of whom are editing different things.)
- How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline? Do you just need a read-only version of the contents of your bases that you can access while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to edit the contents of records while offline? Or do you need to have the ability to change the database schemata while offline? (In order, these are: comparatively simple to implement; difficult to implement; incredibly difficult to implement.)
- For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline? For a few minutes, as you drive through a tunnel? (Please don’t Airtable and drive.) For a few hours, as you sit in an airport terminal and refuse to pay for overpriced WiFi? For a few weeks, as you trek through the farthest reaches of frigid Nunavut?
- How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually? One potential way of alleviating the issues that arise with resolving merge conflicts is to force end users to make decisions on how to solve specific conflicts. This, however, comes with its own set of potential problems (e.g. being stalled by having to resolve a merge conflict when all you want to do is work, your co-workers getting mad that you merged over their data without their permission).
- Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile? Anecdotally, it seems like many of the people who want offline mode want it for mobile, but it would be good for us to get some clarification on that front.
Hi, I too started using AirTable recently and was dismayed to learn the iPad/iPhone apps just show nothing when there’s no internet connection. I think a database app like this really needs offline mode for best use.
How would you want to use Airtable offline?
As a coach. Recording client meetings, in person (without reliable wi-fi) or on the phone (potentially remote, with no cell signal). Brush up on the details of previous meetings, that sort of thing.
Do you use Airtable alone, or with collaborators?
Alone, for now
How much do you need to be able to do in Airtable while offline?
Read, edit existing records, add new records. Not so much tinkering with the database schema
For how long do you need to be able to use Airtable offline?
However long it takes. A few hours? A regular train journey I make – with incredibly patchy signal – takes three hours. I’d want to be working, using Airtable, the entire way, ideally.
How tolerant would you be of having to resolve merge conflicts manually?
Very tolerant. It’s just me. I know what’s the truth and what’s not.
Would you primarily be using offline mode on desktop or mobile?
Ideally both, but given the comparatively primitive iOS version, I’d settle for this being a mobile-only solution. If I knew I had to stick to iOS when working offline, that’d be ok.
I’ve read someone else’s suggestion for a sort of Offline toggle and that would work for me. If I knew I was going to be suffering wi-fi or mobile signal woes, but had work to do, I’d happily engage Offline mode, keep all my editing to the one device, and wait for the return home to switch back online and upload all my changes.
I definitely need to be able to see my bases, without an internet connection!
Thanks for listening.
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