Zumero - replicate and sync SQL data across your team's mobile devices

There's more than one way to share data between mobile devices and servers. A popular choice is to use a REST architecture, where your application checks in via web requests to…

• tell the server it has new data.
• tell the server it has updated data.
• tell the server it's deleted some data.
• ask the server for updated data.

Assuming the network connection is up, your application then has to process these updates, perhaps asking the server for new updates after sending your own, handle any conflicts that may have arisen, etc.

If the REST call fails, your application now has to either (a) fail the operation and apologize to the user or (b) save the updated data to be retransmitted at a later date, hopefully without conflicting changes having occurred in the meantime.

All that code, and none of it has anything to do with what the application does. And you still have a local database that your real application code deals with.

Zumero asks (and answers): "What if that local database was all the mobile application had to worry about?" You update your database, and trust that it's being updated as needed when the outside world changes. Zumero…

• makes sure the server has your latest changes.
• makes sure you have the latest changes from the server and from other mobile users.
• handles merges and conflicts in one place. By the time Zumero sends you new data, it's already sorted out.
• worries about re-sending updates that didn't go through earlier.