Start with the work that must continue
Decide which information a person needs on the device and which actions can safely wait for a connection. A saved local record and a record received by the server are different states. Show that difference clearly.
Android's official offline-first guidance describes local and network data sources, queued writes and conflict resolution. These are design decisions to make early, alongside the field workflow.
Make recovery part of the workflow
- Show whether a record is saved, waiting to sync or needs attention.
- Keep unsent work when the app closes or a connection drops.
- Make retries safe so reconnecting does not create duplicate records.
- Define how conflicting changes will be resolved.
Test the handover to the office
Walk through a task with the connection disabled, then restore it. Check the device and the receiving system. The job is complete when both show the expected record and the worker can tell what happened.
The Stevedoring App's published Android listing includes offline capture and automatic synchronisation. Talk to us about the offline requirements of your own operation.