Why Local-First Apps Haven't Become Popular?
6 hours ago
- #local-first
- #offline-apps
- #distributed-systems
- Offline-first apps promise instant loading and privacy but are not widely adopted due to sync challenges.
- Syncing in local-first apps is hard because they function as distributed systems with unreliable ordering and conflicts.
- Unreliable ordering occurs when events happen on different devices at different times, leading to inconsistent results.
- Hybrid Logical Clocks (HLCs) solve ordering issues by combining physical and logical time for consistent event ordering.
- Conflicts arise when multiple devices modify the same data independently, requiring conflict resolution strategies.
- Conflict-Free Replicated Data Types (CRDTs) ensure commutativity and idempotence, allowing devices to converge to the same state.
- Last-Write-Wins (LWW) is a simple CRDT strategy where the latest timestamp update wins.
- SQLite is ideal for local-first apps due to its reliability, lightweight nature, and cross-platform availability.
- A SQLite extension can manage changes with timestamps, ensuring deterministic convergence across devices.
- Local-first apps should embrace eventual consistency, HLCs, and CRDTs for reliable offline functionality.