Google’s VP of Engineering Vic Gundotra has demonstrated a new Gmail application that will run on iPhone, Google Android phone and other mobile platforms. The new Gmail mobile app previewed using an iPhone 3G which Gundotra set into airplane mode. Despite having no cellular connection, the iPhone was still able to receive a message.The application was said to be running on HTML5’s AppCache and Databased standards which store user-data and the Gmail software on the iPhone. HTML5 makes data loading faster than what the current Gmail iPhone app can do.
The use of the HTML5 standards also makes it possible for other devices to run the Gmail even in offline mode. Other mobile devices aside from the iPhone which supports the HTML5 standard would be able to run the offline Gmail also. In addition, this would also allow mobile software developers to create a single app that will run on multiple mobile platforms. Palm Pre also uses the same HTML5 engine. So Palm Pre users has something to look forward to as well.
Aside from the offline Gmail, a floating toolbar sitting on top of the iPhone screen will also be made available. This would enable the device to track down user’s email browsing frequency as well as message labeling support.
Gmail in offline mode looks to be a promising mobile web application. Hopefully, Google will announce something about this in the coming days.
In the meantime, here’s the demonstration of how Gmail in offline mode would function and look like.
