How to Use Redis with SAP Cloud SDK

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Note: For a complete overview of our blog post series visit the SAP Cloud SDK Overview.

 



For an overview of new features of the SAP Cloud SDK, please look at our recent announcement post.

Introduction

With the new version 3 of SAP Cloud SDK, it's possible to integrate custom caching frameworks. The application developer can now take the library of their choice, as long as it supports JCache (JSR-107). By loading dependencies into the Maven project, the caching framework is enabled automatically due to the Service Provider Interface (SPI).

By default the Caffeine library is recommended for easy to use, efficient caching. But certain use cases require a distributed caching setup, which allows the storing of data far beyond the application container scope.

Redis

One of the most popular tools to store in-memory data is Redis. The open source tool can be used as database, message broker and cache. It features built-in functionality for data replication, transactions and high availability. Even using on-disk persistence is possible. And there is much more to discover with this software.

Run locally

There are multiple ways to start a Redis instance. Probably the easiest way is by running a local docker container:

// for running a instance as daemon service

docker run --name my-redis -d -p 6379:6379 redis



// for temporarily running the instance in the current terminal

docker run --name my-redis -it --rm -p 6379:6379 redis

The default port for Redis is 6379 but it can be changed to any open port number.

Caching with the SAP Cloud SDK

To use caching with SAP Cloud SDK it's recommended to use the ResilienceDecorator. This utility class allows to decorate a given lambda (e.g. external service call) with resilient mechanisms:

• timeout


• circuit breaker


• bulkhead


• fallback


• caching

Add Maven Dependency

By default the resilience strategy featuring Resilience4j is chosen for Cloud SDK. But for caching there is no default dependency provided, the application developer is required to decide on a module for caching.

Usually the following dependency would be recommended for Caffeine:

<dependency>

    <groupId>com.github.ben-manes.caffeine</groupId>

    <artifactId>jcache</artifactId>

    <version>2.8.0</version>

</dependency>

But for enabling Redis you should choose the following dependency instead:

<dependency>

  <groupId>org.redisson</groupId>

  <artifactId>redisson</artifactId>

  <version>3.11.2</version>

</dependency>

Note: Please take a (new) version of your choice.

The Redisson library is a Java client for connecting and using Redis. It also includes a JCache implementation for the SPI.

Add Redisson Configuration

At runtime Redisson requires a configuration file, from which it reads the current configuration. Please consider other configuration mechanisms as well. The following file features the most basic setup:

./application/src/main/resources/redisson-jcache.yaml

singleServerConfig:

  address: "redis://127.0.0.1:6379"

By having the file in the "resource" folder we make sure it will be available at runtime. Please change the configuration with regards to your application setup.

Usage with SAP Cloud SDK

Now consider you have the following computation heavy operation, for which you want to apply a resilience and caching strategy:

Supplier<T> busyLambda;

Now when using the ResilienceDecorator you can enable caching to the lambda with the following code:

import com.sap.cloud.sdk.cloudplatform.resilience.ResilienceDecorator;

import com.sap.cloud.sdk.cloudplatform.resilience.ResilienceConfiguration;



ResilienceConfiguration.CacheConfiguration cacheConfiguration =

  ResilienceConfiguration.CacheConfiguration.of(Duration.ofSeconds(10)).withoutParameters();



ResilienceConfiguration resilienceConfiguration =

  ResilienceConfiguration.of(YourServiceClass.class).cacheConfiguration(cacheConfiguration);



T result = ResilienceDecorator.executeSupplier(busyLambda, resilienceConfiguration);

The ResilienceDecorator is instantiated with the reference of your service class. You can use any other type of identifier heres as well. Also the decorator utility class features many other methods to decorate (and execute) a lambda. Please find the JavaDoc for more information.

Here the resilience configuration only features a dedicated cache configuration. Settings for timeout, circuit breaker and bulkhead are implicitly taken from default values.

The configuration for cache declares a lifetime of ten seconds after which the next lambda invocation triggers a cache miss and the underlying method will be called - and it's response persisted in the cache again. Additional a set of parameters could be provided in order to differentiate between requests depending on arguments which may have been used to define the busySupplier. But to keep to keep the example simple, we declare "withoutParameters".

That's it.

Now Redis is being used by default in your application with the SAP Cloud SDK.