Working offline, and how syncing works

The places worth documenting rarely have signal. This is what actually happens when there is none.

What works with no connection

Opening a form, filling it in, taking photos, capturing a signature and hitting submit. The submission is stored on the device and queued.

What happens when signal returns

The queue syncs by itself. Nothing needs to be re-typed and nothing needs anyone to remember to press a button.

Reference lists offline

Customer, employee and parts lists come from the last snapshot the device pulled, and the form tells you when that was. Snapshots refresh when you are online: on demand from the sync control, after a submission, and when a dispatched job arrives.

If a price changed this morning and a technician has been out of signal since yesterday, they will see yesterday's price and the form will say so. That is deliberate — a stale number you can see the age of beats a blank field.

Do not sign out in the field

Signing out clears the device. If there is anything queued, get back into signal and let it sync first.

If something looks stuck

Leave the app open on a connection for a minute; the queue retries on its own. If a submission still has not appeared in the office after that, see A submission is missing.