Setup

To demonstrate a basic setup, we're going to use the built-in Rails channel generator to create an ActionCable Channel class called ExampleChannel. If this is the first time you've generated a Channel, a number of important files and folders will be created.

bundle exec rails generate channel example

In this configuration, every client that subscribes to ExampleChannel will receive any broadcasts sent to to a stream called visitors. We'll talk more about streams soon. For now, visitors is for operations that will be sent to everyone currently looking at your site.

app/channels/example_channel.rb
class ExampleChannel < ApplicationCable::Channel
  def subscribed
    stream_from "visitors"
  end
end

The generator also creates a JavaScript channel subscriber. Import CableReady and modify the received method to check incoming data for CableReady broadcasts.

app/javascript/channels/example_channel.js
import CableReady from 'cable_ready'
import consumer from './consumer'
​
consumer.subscriptions.create('ExampleChannel', {
  received (data) {
    if (data.cableReady) CableReady.perform(data.operations)
  }
})

That's it! Let's get this party started and learn how to broadcast operations.