What is Service Worker?

Service Workers are scripts that run in the background, separate from web pages, enabling features like offline functionality, push notifications, and background sync. They're essential for Progressive Web Apps.

Service worker capabilities:

• Offline support: Cache resources and serve them when offline
• Background sync: Defer actions until connectivity is restored
• Push notifications: Receive and display notifications
• Network intercepting: Control how network requests are handled
• Cache management: Intelligent caching strategies

Basic service worker:

self.addEventListener('install', (event) => {
  event.waitUntil(
    caches.open('v1').then((cache) => {
      return cache.addAll(['/','/ styles.css','/app.js']);
    })
  );
});

self.addEventListener('fetch', (event) => {
  event.respondWith(
    caches.match(event.request).then((response) => {
      return response || fetch(event.request);
    })
  );
});

Key benefits:

• Improved performance: Cached resources load instantly
• Offline experience: App works without internet connection
• Reliability: Graceful degradation when network fails
• Engagement: Push notifications re-engage users

AI-friendly: Service Workers follow event-driven patterns that AI can implement. AI can generate caching strategies, implement offline-first approaches, handle background sync, and ensure proper service worker lifecycle management.