Couchdb builtin offline ability and can sync when you get a connection.

If you use the Apex data loader, free from salesforce, you can automate the imports from the command line. You just need to be sure to watch password expiration if the process is automated.

You have an application that is 25 years old with no documentation for the tables, c-isam tables. You have to make this wonderful application talk to a modern day databases. You have been given a budget of $0 to get this task completed. You have just enough time to learn syntax to put something together that will hopefully work. That is how this happens.

Being an end user and this feature was not requested in the original scope of the project I was asked to submit a Change Request Form. I was advised that the change will be reviewed by a committee and they would get back to with an estimate on cost and time to implement. In the meantime I sit in the dark hoping for the new feature to be implemented.