Offline-First Field Apps: CRDTs vs Last-Write-Wins for Rural Routes
For most field apps, use field-level merge as the default for inspection forms and orders. Record inventory counts as operations (deltas or observations) instead of stored totals. Keep last-write-wins only for fields that one person owns, like a job status. Payments, stock limits and approvals should stay server-authoritative. Don't order writes by device clock time. A full CRDT library is only worth it when several people edit the same long text or list at once.