Apple PastryKit Gives Web Apps a Native Feel

Apple has been developing a PastryKit framework which provides Web Apps with a Native App feel.

John Gruber from Daring Fireball noticed that the iPhone User Guide performed and looked very similar to native application. That's because it uses the PastryKit framework in development by Apple.


The framework:
- Completely hides the address bar, even when running not from a saved-to-the-home app icon, but within a page in MobileSafari itself.
- Allows for fixed-position toolbars that never budge from the top when you scroll.
- And: sets its own scrolling friction coefficient, allowing you to fling long lists.

After installing the User Guide app to your home screen and launching it from there, there's really very little to suggest that it isn’t a native iPhone application. No MobileSafari address bar at the top, no MobileSafari toolbar at the bottom. Scrolling is fast and has momentum. It even works perfectly offline, because the contents of the user guide are stored locally in a database using HTML5.

It's unclear whether PastryKit is something Apple intends to make public. Technically, any of these features could be accomplished by a very advanced coder; however, going to all this trouble to create the framework for internal use only seems like a waste of resources.

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