June 2018 Summaries

The Internet of Things (IoT) presents a unique challenge for databases due to large and fast data from various devices, coupled with critical latency requirements. To address this, edge computing has become increasingly important, and fog computing is emerging as a solution that brings cloud principals to the edge. Fog computing enables data communication between IoT devices, edge devices, fog nodes, and the cloud, while handling east-west communication between these components. A database for the "intelligent edge" is needed to handle massive amounts of high-velocity data from various sensors and devices, requiring real-time processing and flexibility in data structures. Redis Enterprise has emerged as a suitable solution, providing blazing fast performance, multi-model capabilities, and a small footprint, making it an ideal choice for IoT applications. The new Azure IoT Edge platform is also emerging as a promising solution, integrating Redis Enterprise to provide a comprehensive edge computing environment.

Redis Enterprise v5.2 has been released with several highly anticipated features that simplify application development and enhance security. The new features support complex data types with seamless automated conflict resolution, allowing for active-active Redis deployments to address various use cases. Causal Consistency in active-active Redis CRDTs delivers a strong consistency model, while the admin action audit trail ensures system management tasks are properly performed and monitored. Additionally, the ability to set a minimum TLS version and HTTPS enforcement provide enhanced security features. The release also supports Redis 4.0.9 and fixes a LUA vulnerability available in open source Redis version 4.0.10.

Redis has completed the SOC 2 Type II compliance audit, demonstrating its commitment to data protection and security. This achievement fulfills Redis' promise of delivering a high degree of trust and security to its customers. The SOC 2 compliance verifies service organizations for assurances about security, availability, processing integrity, confidentiality and privacy. By offering Redis Enterprise databases as both software and a service, the company provides two models: Cloud (Hosted) and VPC (Managed), both included in the SOC 2 compliance. This certification takes Redis closer to meeting other relevant industry or territory compliance requirements.

This post provides a step-by-step guide on how to enable secure connections to Redis Enterprise Cloud using SSL in Java, including converting PEM files into a format that can be used by the JCA providers, configuring SSL in client code, and specifying system properties for debugging and authentication. The process involves transforming credential files from Redis Enterprise Cloud into a format that works with JavaSE, creating keystore and truststore repositories, and modifying client code to establish an SSL connection.

The patch for the Redis bug has been released to fix a potentially exploitable issue related to the MsgPack library and its variadic function in Lua, which could lead to stack overflow and remote code execution if not properly checked. The bug is considered low-risk as it would require very specific scenarios and untrusted user inputs to be exploited. However, applying the patch ensures that the fix is available for all users, including those using Redis Enterprise offerings. Users are advised to ensure their Redis instances are not unrestrictedly open to the internet and upgrade to the latest version of Redis if necessary. The patch has also been implemented in other Lua libraries to address similar issues.

This post provides a guide on setting up a development environment for an application using a multi-model Redis database on Kubernetes. It explains the concept of multi-model databases and how Redis can be extended with modules to support multiple data models. The author has created an open source container image, redismod, which includes all five modules and can be deployed and run on Kubernetes. The post also demonstrates how to use minikube to quickly get a local Kubernetes cluster up and running the redismod container in just five steps. Finally, it explains how to connect to the redismod service from an application for data modeling with multiple modules on Redis.

Enabling encrypted connections on a server is crucial for secure communication between clients and servers. In this tutorial, we walk through an easy three-step process to turn on, test, and configure encrypted connections between Redis Enterprise Cloud and a Python client using SSL. The steps involve enabling SSL for the database, generating a certificate for the client, testing the SSL connection with OpenSSL s_client command, and modifying the client code to establish SSL connections. We also discuss the importance of mutual authentication between clients and servers, as well as the use of public-key cryptography in SSL.