Redis in Rails

Playreal encountered a performance issue when a large number of users logged in to retrieve game data and teammate records. I used Redis to solve the problem.

What is Redis?

Redis is an in-memory data structure store. It can be used as a database, cache, and message broker, and supports various data structures such as strings, hashes, lists, sets, and more. Redis is often used for real-time data processing, high-speed data ingestion, and message brokering. It is known for its speed and flexibility, and is widely used in web applications, gaming, ad tech, and other industries.

Advantage of using Redis

One of the main advantages of using Redis in a project is its high performance and ability to handle a large amount of data. Because Redis stores data in memory, it can process requests very quickly, making it well-suited for real-time applications and other high-speed data processing tasks. Redis also supports a wide variety of data structures, which makes it a flexible solution that can be used in a variety of different applications. Additionally, Redis has robust built-in features such as replication and support for multiple data structures, which make it a powerful tool for building scalable and high-performance systems.

How to start with RoR?

To use Redis with Ruby on Rails, you will first need to install the redis gem. This can be done by adding the following line to your Gemfile:

gem 'redis'

Once the gem is installed, you can configure your Rails app to use Redis by adding the following settings to your config/application.rb file:

config.cache_store = :redis_store, 'redis://localhost:6379/0/cache', { expires_in: 90.minutes }

You can then use the Rails.cache object to store and retrieve data from Redis. For example, the following code will store a value in Redis and then retrieve it:

Rails.cache.write('my_key', 'my_value')
my_value = Rails.cache.read('my_key')

You can also use Redis as a data store in your Rails app. To do this, you will need to install the redis-rails gem, which provides Redis-specific functionality for Rails. You can add this gem to your Gemfile with the following line:

gem 'redis-rails'

Once the gem is installed, you can use the Redis::List and Redis::Hash classes to store and retrieve data in Redis. For example, the following code will store a list and a hash in Redis and then retrieve them:

list = Redis::List.new('my_list')
list << 'item1'
list << 'item2'

hash = Redis::Hash.new('my_hash')
hash['key1'] = 'value1'
hash['key2'] = 'value2'

my_list = Redis::List.new('my_list')
my_hash = Redis::Hash.new('my_hash')

Overall, using Redis with Ruby on Rails is a straightforward process that can help improve the performance and scalability of your app.