Google's online application, and others in the market, have been dinged for requiring an active connection to the Internet, making it impossible to work offline.

But the always-on requirement may change for Google.

Mozilla Corp., which has partnered with Google in the past -- Firefox, for example, offers up Google as its default search engine -- will include support for offline applications running within the browser, according to planning documents posted on the Mozilla site.

The developers of Firefox 3.0 have pegged offline app support as "P1" in the current feature spreadsheet which is, not ironically, posted on Google Docs & Spreadsheets. By Mozilla's definition, P1 means that the feature is "required as a minimum for this release to be complete...the product will not ship without these." Firefox 3.0, now dubbed "Gran Paradiso" and in alpha testing, is to launch later this year.

Although Mozilla declined to discuss details of Firefox 3.0's offline application support with Computerworld, in an earlier interview Tuesday in London, Mike Schroepfer, Mozilla's vice president for engineering, confirmed that offline use had been targeted in the release.