I know where I am getting hung up. Looking at Editing using a toolkit there is a reference to using the PopupView on a geodatabase layer. However, I don't know when feature is at the end of the setFeature method. Using PopupView was a no brainer for an online ArcGISFeatureLayer, but I have been banging my head for days on how to edit a local layer when I start in a disconnected environment.
So what is feature? This has to something simple that I am missing. The solution is to create this pop up on a local layer.
// for a FeatureLayer
PopupView contentPanel = PopupView.createEditView("Edit Attributes", featureLayer);
// set layer, geodatabase feature table, and feature - edits take place on the feature table
contentPanel.setFeature(featureLayer, (GeodatabaseFeatureTable) featureLayer.getFeatureTable(), feature);