background_thread code by Bosco So <rubymeetup _AT_ boscoso _DOT_ com>

This code is designed to start up a background thread for a Rails app

hosted on Heroku. This background thread executes a block of code once

every 5 seconds. By storing the state of the thread in a database row,

the code maintains only 1 master thread even if multiple threads are

started; thus only 1 thread calls your block of code. If a master

thread dies, then a non-master threads will promote itself to be a

master thread and execute your block.

This code is useful only for Heroku hosted apps, which do not have

access to background processes like BackgrounDRB. If you're not

running on Heroku, you should check out these articles on Rails and

threading

http://delicious.com/boscomonkey/ruby+thread

INSTALLATION

- Copy these files into your rails directory

- Run the migration

- Look at the file config/initializers/start_thread_bureaucrat.rb for

an example of how to start a master thread

(a.k.a. ThreadBureaucrat). Alter the block in this file as per the

functionality you desire.

TODO

This should be a plugin. But Vijay wanted something NOW -

http://tinyurl.com/7thf7t

LICENSE

Standard MIT license