Using AnyCable with Hotwire

AnyCable is fully compatible with Hotwire applications without the need for any additional configuration. See the getting started guide here.

However, you can squeeze even more power from AnyCable for Hotwire apps by combining several features. Read below.

RPC-less setup

📖 See also JWT identification and “hot streams”.

AnyCable-Go provides a feature called signed streams, which implements the require turbo-rails Action Cable functionality right in the WebSocket server. This means that subscribing to Turbo Streams doesn't require calling a gRPC Rails server.

If you're only using Turbo Streams and don't rely on pure Action Cable, you can simplify your AnyCable configuration (infrastructure, deployment) by switching to signed streams and JWT authentication.

What's the point? Here are the main benefits of going the RPC-less way:

• Improve application performance by speeding up WebSocket handshakes and commands.
• Reduce infrastructure burden by removing the need to run a separate service (RPC). Especially helpful on Heroku.
• Open the possibility of using Turbo Streams without Rails and even Ruby!

The default flow with AnyCable RPC looks like this:

Compare this with the RPC-less configuration which has the aforementioned features:

🎥 Check out this AnyCasts screencast—it's a video guide on setting up Hotwire with AnyCable in the RPC-less way: Exploring Rails 7, Hotwire and AnyCable speedy streams.

Step-by-step guide on going RPC-less

• Install and configure the anycable-rails-jwt gem:

# anycable.yml
production:
  jwt_id_key: "some-secret-key"Copy to clipboardErrorCopied

• Configure the Turbo Streams verifier key:

# config/environments/production.rb
config.turbo.signed_stream_verifier_key = "s3cЯeT"Copy to clipboardErrorCopied

• Disable Disconnect RPC calls and enable JWT identification and signed streams in AnyCable-Go:

ANYCABLE_JWT_ID_KEY=some-secret-key \
ANYCABLE_TURBO_RAILS_KEY=s3cЯeT \
ANYCABLE_DISABLE_DISCONNECT=true \
anycable-go

# or via cli args
anycable-go --jwt_id_key=some-secret-key --turbo_rails_key=s3cЯeT --disable_disconnectCopy to clipboardErrorCopied

NOTE: Disabling Disconnect calls is safe unless you have some custom logic in the ApplicationCable::Connection#disconnect method. Otherwise, you still need to run the RPC server.