Caching and OpenLayers Mobile Code Sprint

We think that a key feature for a mobile mapping application is the ability to view maps offline. One of our key use cases, a educational field trip exercise, requires access to maps in locations where network connectivity might be poor or non existant. Having access offline also widens the kinds of device we can use to include WiFi only devices such as the iPod Touch and no SIM iPad tablet.  Threfore we’ve been working hard over the last couple of months on working out how we can cache maps.  We’ve made alot of progress on this, developing the caching ability in the TouchMapLite library to be more robust and work with our WMS mapping server.

This is possible in a web app environment thanks to 3 seperate  HTML5 initiatives that assist web developers in caching data listed below.

It’s quite easy to get these three flavours of caching mixed up (I’ve done so myself), so one of our engineers has blogged on the subject, explaining what each one does and offering some very helpful hints and gotchas. The first post focuses on the Application Cache, with similar posts on SQL database and Web Storage to follow shortly [update 22 feb 2011: Our engineer has now blogged part 2 ( web SQL database) and part 3 (Web Storage) – some very useful comparisons.

We are going to share the techniques we’ve developed for caching maps during the upcoming OpenLayers Code Sprint in Lausanne later this month. It’s really great to see the OpenLayers development community tackling mobile in earnest this year. Respect to CampToCamp and other sponsers for organizing and sponsoring the event. Geomobile is looking forward to sharing progress with its readers!