docs/concepts/components/redis.md

Redis and Actions

Actions can use Redis in two ways:

1. For state persistence and restoration
2. For enabling pub-sub async style message delivery

Creating a Redis Store

Actions can use any Redis instance - containerized, running on your local dev machine, or a managed cloud service. If you already have a Redis store, move on to the Configuration section.

Creating an Azure Managed Redis Cache

Note: this approach requires having an Azure Subscription.

1. Open this link to start the Azure Redis Cache creation flow. Log in if necessary.
2. Fill out necessary information and check the "Unblock port 6379" box, which will allow us to persist state without SSL.
3. Click "Create" to kickoff deployment of your Redis instance.
4. Once your instance is created, you'll need to grab your access key. Navigate to "Access Keys" under "Settings" and copy your key.
5. Finally, we need to add our key and our host to a redis.yaml file that Actions can apply to our cluster. If you're running a sample, you'll add the host and key to the provided redis.yaml. If you're creating a project from the ground up, you'll create a redis.yaml file as specified in Configuration. Set the redisHost key to actions-redis.redis.cache.windows.net:6379 and the redisPassword key to the key you copied in step 4.

Creating a Redis Cache in your Kubernetes Cluster using Helm

We can use Helm to quickly create a Redis instance in our Kubernetes cluster. This approach requires Installing Helm.

1. Install Redis into your cluster: helm install stable/redis --name redis --set image.tag=5.0.5-debian-9-r104. Note that we're explicitly setting an image tag to get a version greater than 5, which is what Actions' pub-sub functionality requires. If you're intending on using Redis as just a state store (and not for pub-sub), you do not have to set the image version.

2. Run kubectl get pods to see the Redis containers now running in your cluster.

3. Run kubectl get svc and copy the cluster IP of your redis-master. Add this IP as the redisHost in your redis.yaml file, followed by ":6379". For example:

       redisHost: "10.0.125.130:6379"
   

4. Next, we'll get our Redis password, which is slightly different depending on the OS we're using:

   • Windows: Run kubectl get secret --namespace default redis -o jsonpath="{.data.redis-password}" > encoded.b64, which will create a file with your encoded password. Next, run certutil -decode encoded.b64 password.txt, which will put your redis password in a text file called password.txt. Copy the password and delete the two files.

   • Linux/MacOS: Run kubectl get secret --namespace default redis -o jsonpath="{.data.redis-password}" | base64 --decode and copy the outputted password.

   Add this password as the redisPassword value in your redis.yaml file. For example:

       redisPassword: "lhDOkwTlp0"
   

Other ways to Create a Redis Cache

• AWS Redis
• GCP Cloud MemoryStore

Configuration

Actions can use Redis as a statestore component (for state persistence and retrieval) or as a messagebus component (for pub-sub).

Configuring Redis for State Persistence and Retrieval

Create a file called redis.yaml, and paste the following:

apiVersion: actions.io/v1alpha1
kind: Component
metadata:
  name: statestore
spec:
  type: state.redis
  connectionInfo:
    redisHost: "YOUR_REDIS_HOST_HERE"
    redisPassword: "YOUR_REDIS_KEY_HERE"

Configuring Redis for Pub/Sub

Create a file called redis.yaml, and paste the following:

apiVersion: actions.io/v1alpha1
kind: Component
metadata:
  name: messagebus
spec:
  type: pubsub.redis
  connectionInfo:
    redisHost: "YOUR_REDIS_HOST_HERE"
    redisPassword: "YOUR_REDIS_PASSWORD_HERE"

Apply the configuration

Kubernetes

kubectl apply -f redis.yaml

Standalone

By default the Actions CLI creates a local Redis instance when you run actions init. However, if you want to configure a different Redis instance, create a directory named eventsources in the root path of your Action binary and then copy your redis.yaml into that directory.