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I guess you all noticed the new “Turbo” link inside the WordPress administration section, but you didn’t bothered to see what’s it all about.

I’ll do this for you. Google Gears is a browser plugin like Flash or QuickTime/Media Player. However Gears works with the browser to enhance web based applications. It can create local database and file storage, and run JavaScript in the background to update them without slowing down the browser.

Clicking on the “Turbo” button will make use of Google’s Gears, offloading some of the data from the cloud into your browser cache. In this case, it’s the latest 200 files from your WordPress media library, the same files you access to stick into blog posts.

Google’s recently open-sourced Gears is an add-on for Firefox 2 and 3 and Internet Explorer 6 and 7 browsers used primarily for downloading, or synchronizing, files for use locally and/or offline. When you click on the “Turbo” link, WordPress uses Gears to download up to 200 files which speed up WordPress functions. The effect combines WordPress’ online capabilities with desktop application power by running JavaScript in the background and utilizing a local database of synchronized data.

Conclusion: if you’ve got Gears installed, hitting the “Turbo” button will give you an installation message. Enabling it allows you to get at your media library faster when you’re on a bad connection. It should speed up writing a new post and make it faster to drop in photos you’ve already uploaded to the service’s cloud storage. One thing Gears is not being used for in this case is offline access, or a way to let you use the blog authoring tools while away from an Internet connection, like Windows Live Writer.

• Matt on Turbo
• WordPress FAQ
• Google Gears