Laravel Tutorial (5.7) Redis

Introduction

Redis is an open source, advanced key-value store. It is often referred to as a data structure server since keys can contain strings, hashes, lists, sets, and sorted sets.

Before using Redis with Laravel, you will need to install the predis/predis package via Composer:

composer require predis/predis

Alternatively, you may install the PhpRedis PHP extension via PECL. The extension is more complex to install but may yield better performance for applications that make heavy use of Redis.

Configuration

The Redis configuration for your application is located in the config/database.php configuration file. Within this file, you will see a redis array containing the Redis servers utilized by your application:

'redis' => [

    'client' => 'predis',

    'default' => [
        'host' => env('REDIS_HOST', '127.0.0.1'),
        'password' => env('REDIS_PASSWORD', null),
        'port' => env('REDIS_PORT', 6379),
        'database' => env('REDIS_DB', 0),
    ],

    'cache' => [
        'host' => env('REDIS_HOST', '127.0.0.1'),
        'password' => env('REDIS_PASSWORD', null),
        'port' => env('REDIS_PORT', 6379),
        'database' => env('REDIS_CACHE_DB', 1),
    ],

],

Connecting to Redis

First, we'll require the Redis Autoloader and register it. Then we'll wrap the client in a try catch block. The connection setting for connecting to Redis on a local server is different from connecting to a remote server.

<?php
require "predis/autoload.php";
PredisAutoloader::register();

try {
	$redis = new PredisClient();

	// This connection is for a remote server
	/*
		$redis = new PredisClient(array(
		    "scheme" => "tcp",
		    "host" => "153.202.124.2",
		    "port" => 6379
		));
	*/
}
catch (Exception $e) {
	die($e->getMessage());
}

Now that we have successfully connected to the Redis server, let's start using Redis.

Redis Datatypes

Redis supports a range of datatypes and you might wonder what a NOSQL key-value store has to do with datatypes? Well, these datatypes help developers store data in a meaningful way and can make data retrieval faster. Here are some of the datatypes supported by Redis:

• String: Similar to Strings in PHP.
• List: Similar to a single dimensional array in PHP. You can push, pop, shift and unshift, the elements that are placed in order or insertion FIFO (first in, first out).
• Hash: Maps between string fields and string values. They are the perfect data type to represent objects (e.g.: A User with a number of fields like name, surname, and so forth).
• Set: Similar to list, except that it has no order and each element may appear only once.
• Sorted Set: Similar to Redis Sets with a unique feature of values stored in set. The difference is that each member of a Sorted Set is associated with score, used to order the set from the smallest score to the largest.

Others are bitmaps and hyperloglogs, but they will not be discussed in this article, as they are pretty dense.

Getters and Setters

In Redis, the most important commands are SET, GET and EXISTS. These commands are used to store, check, and retrieve data from a Redis server. Just like the commands, the Predis class can be used to perform Redis operations by methods with the same name as commands. For example:

<?php
// sets message to contian "Hello world"
$redis->set(';message';, ';Hello world';);

// gets the value of message
$value = $redis->get('message');

// Hello world
print($value); 

echo ($redis->exists('message')) ? "Oui" : "please populate the message key";

Increments and Decrements

INCR and DECR are commands used to either decrease or increase a value.

<?php
$redis->set("counter", 0);

$redis->incr("counter"); // 1
$redis->incr("counter"); // 2

$redis->decr("counter"); // 1

We can also increase the values of the counter key by larger integer values or we can decrease the value of the counter key with the INCRBY and DECRBY commands.

<?php
$redis->set("counter", 0);

$redis->incrby("counter", 15); // 15
$redis->incrby("counter", 5);  // 20

$redis->decrby("counter", 10); // 10

Working with Lists

There are a few basic Redis commands for working with lists and they are:

• LPUSH: adds an element to the beginning of a list
• RPUSH: add an element to the end of a list
• LPOP: removes the first element from a list and returns it
• RPOP: removes the last element from a list and returns it
• LLEN: gets the length of a list
• LRANGE: gets a range of elements from a list

Simple List Usage:

<?php
$redis->rpush("languages", "french"); // [french]
$redis->rpush("languages", "arabic"); // [french, arabic]

$redis->lpush("languages", "english"); // [english, french, arabic]
$redis->lpush("languages", "swedish"); // [swedish, english, french, arabic]

$redis->lpop("languages"); // [english, french, arabic]
$redis->rpop("languages"); // [english, french]

$redis->llen("languages"); // 2

$redis->lrange("languages", 0, -1); // returns all elements
$redis->lrange("languages", 0, 1); // [english, french]

Working with Hashes

A hash in Redis is a map between one string field and string values, like a one-to-many relationship. The commands associated with hashes in Redis are:

• HSET: sets a key-value on the hash
• HGET: gets a key-value on the hash
• HGETALL: gets all key-values from the hash
• HMSET: mass assigns several key-values to a hash
• HDEL: deletes a key from the object
• HINCRBY: increments a key-value from the hash with a given value.

<?php
$key = ';linus torvalds';;
$redis->hset($key, ';age';, 44);
$redis->hset($key, ';country';, ';finland';);
$redis->hset($key, 'occupation', 'software engineer');
$redis->hset($key, 'reknown', 'linux kernel');
$redis->hset($key, 'to delete', 'i will be deleted');

$redis->get($key, 'age'); // 44
$redis->get($key, 'country')); // Finland

$redis->del($key, 'to delete');

$redis->hincrby($key, 'age', 20); // 64

$redis->hmset($key, [
    'age' => 44,
    'country' => 'finland',
    'occupation' => 'software engineer',
    'reknown' => 'linux kernel',
]);

// finally
$data = $redis->hgetall($key);
print_r($data); // returns all key-value that belongs to the hash
/*
    [
        'age' => 44,
        'country' => 'finland',
        'occupation' => 'software engineer',
        'reknown' => 'linux kernel',
    ]
*/

Working with Sets

The list of commands associated with sets include: - SADD: adds a N number of values to the key - SREM: removes N number of values from a key - SISMEMBER: if a value exists - SMEMBERS: lists of values in the set.

<?php
$key = "countries";
$redis->sadd($key, ';china';);
$redis->sadd($key, ['england', 'france', 'germany']);
$redis->sadd($key, 'china'); // this entry is ignored

$redis->srem($key, ['england', 'china']);

$redis->sismember($key, 'england'); // false

$redis->smembers($key); // ['france', 'germany']

Set Expiry and Persistence

Since Redis is an in-memory data store, you would probably not store data forever. Therefore, this brings us to EXPIRE, EXPIREAT, TTL, PERSIST - EXPIRE: sets an expiration time, in seconds, for the key after which it is deleted - EXPIREAT: sets an expiration time using unix timestamps for the key after which it is deleted - TTL: gets the remaining time left for a key expiration - PERSIST: makes a key last forever by removing the expiration timer from the key.

$key = "expire in 1 hour";
$redis->expire($key, 3600); // expires in 1 hour
$redis->expireat($key, time() + 3600); // expires in 1 hour

sleep(600); // don't try this, just an illustration for time spent

$redis->ttl($key); // 3000, ergo expires in 50 minutes

$redis->persist($key); // this will never expire.

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