Google's New HTML5 Chrome Apps For Gmail, Calendar And Docs Give Users Offline Access
As we reported at Google I/O in May, Google has been working on offline versions of their three most popular apps: Gmail, Google Calendar, and Google Docs. Google previously offered offline access for Gmail …
Context & Ripple Effects
Offline Google apps have been a stop-start story since the company first promised to bring the cloud with you back in 2008 via Gears, then spent 2009 signaling it was waving goodbye to Gears in favor of HTML5. The gap between those two moves showed in May 2011, when Google actually pulled offline Gmail from Chrome while the replacement was rebuilt on open web standards.
Today's release closes that loop: the three apps Google flagged at I/O in May — Gmail, Calendar and Docs — now ship as HTML5 Chrome apps with offline access restored. The timing matters because Chrome OS machines, which have no native app fallback, are just reaching users, making browser-based offline capability a launch requirement rather than a nice-to-have.
First-order effects
- Chrome users regain offline Gmail, Calendar and Docs access that was removed when the old Gears-based version was retired earlier this year, with the new apps installable directly from the Chrome Web Store.
Second-order effects
- Microsoft's Office franchise faces a more credible web-app alternative for the connected-but-sometimes-offline worker, since the standard objection to browser productivity suites — no work without a network — is now answered inside Chrome itself.
Third-order effects
- If HTML5 proves sufficient for offline-capable productivity apps, the browser consolidates its position as the application platform, weakening the case for native desktop clients and validating the Chrome OS bet of an operating system that is little more than a browser.
The trend: Web applications are absorbing the capabilities that once justified native software, with Google using its own suite as the proof case for an HTML5-first platform strategy.