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Getting Started

Quick start​

Add Shrine to the Gemfile and write an initializer which sets up the storage and loads integration for your persistence library:

# Gemfile gem "shrine", "~> 3.0"
require "shrine" require "shrine/storage/file_system"  Shrine.storages = {  cache: Shrine::Storage::FileSystem.new("public", prefix: "uploads/cache"), # temporary  store: Shrine::Storage::FileSystem.new("public", prefix: "uploads"), # permanent }  Shrine.plugin :sequel # or :activerecord Shrine.plugin :cached_attachment_data # for retaining the cached file across form redisplays Shrine.plugin :restore_cached_data # re-extract metadata when attaching a cached file Shrine.plugin :rack_file # for non-Rails apps

Next decide how you will name the attachment attribute on your model, and run a migration that adds an <attachment>_data text or JSON column, which Shrine will use to store all information about the attachment:

Sequel.migration do  change do  add_column :photos, :image_data, :text # or :jsonb  end end

If using jsonb consider adding a gin index for fast key-value pair searchability within image_data.

Now you can create an uploader class for the type of files you want to upload, and add a virtual attribute for handling attachments using this uploader to your model. If you do not care about adding plugins or additional processing, you can use Shrine::Attachment.

class ImageUploader < Shrine  # plugins and uploading logic end
class Photo < Sequel::Model  include ImageUploader::Attachment(:image) # adds an `image` virtual attribute end

Let's now add the form fields which will use this virtual attribute (NOT the <attachment>_data column attribute). We need (1) a file field for choosing files, and (2) a hidden field for retaining the uploaded file in case of validation errors and for potential direct uploads.

form_for @photo do |f|  f.hidden_field :image, value: @photo.cached_image_data, id: nil  f.file_field :image  f.submit end

Note that the file field needs to go after the hidden field, so that selecting a new file can always override the cached file in the hidden field. Also notice the enctype="multipart/form-data" HTML attribute, which is required for submitting files through the form (the Rails form builder will automatically generate this for you).

When the form is submitted, in your router/controller you can assign the file from request params to the attachment attribute on the model.

class PhotosController < ApplicationController  def create  Photo.create(photo_params)  # ...  end   private   def photo_params  params.require(:photo).permit(:image)  end end

Once a file is uploaded and attached to the record, you can retrieve a URL to the uploaded file with #<attachment>_url and display it on the page:

<%= image_tag @photo.image_url %>

Storage​

A "storage" in Shrine is an object that encapsulates communication with a specific storage service, by implementing a common public interface. Storage instances are registered under an identifier in Shrine.storages, so that they can later be used by uploaders.

Shrine ships with the following storages:

Here is how we might configure Shrine with S3 storage:

# Gemfile gem "aws-sdk-s3", "~> 1.14" # for AWS S3 storage
require "shrine/storage/s3"  s3_options = {  bucket: "<YOUR BUCKET>", # required  region: "<YOUR REGION>", # required  access_key_id: "<YOUR ACCESS KEY ID>",  secret_access_key: "<YOUR SECRET ACCESS KEY>", }  Shrine.storages = {  cache: Shrine::Storage::S3.new(prefix: "cache", **s3_options), # temporary  store: Shrine::Storage::S3.new(**s3_options), # permanent }

The above example sets up S3 for both temporary and permanent storage, which is suitable for direct uploads. The :cache and :store names are special only in terms that the attacher will automatically pick them up, you can also register more storage objects under different names.

See the FileSystem/S3/Memory storage docs for more details. There are many more Shrine storages provided by external gems, and you can also create your own storage.

Uploader​

Uploaders are subclasses of Shrine, and they wrap the actual upload to the storage. They perform common tasks around upload that aren't related to a particular storage.

class MyUploader < Shrine  # image attachment logic end

It's common to create an uploader for each type of file that you want to handle (ImageUploader, VideoUploader, AudioUploader etc), but really you can organize them in any way you like.

Uploading​

The main method of the uploader is Shrine.upload, which takes an IO-like object and a storage identifier on the input, and returns a representation of the uploaded file on the output.

MyUploader.upload(file, :store) #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile>

Internally this instantiates the uploader with the storage and calls Shrine#upload:

uploader = MyUploader.new(:store) uploader.upload(file) #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile>

Some of the tasks performed by #upload include:

The second argument is a "context" hash which is forwarded to places like metadata extraction and location generation, but it has a few special options:

uploader.upload(io, metadata: { "foo" => "bar" }) # add metadata uploader.upload(io, location: "path/to/file") # specify custom location uploader.upload(io, upload_options: { acl: "public-read" }) # add options to Storage#upload

IO abstraction​

Shrine is able to upload any IO-like object that implement methods #read, #rewind, #eof? and #close whose behaviour matches the IO class. This includes but is not limited to the following objects:

uploader.upload File.open("/path/to/file", binmode: true) # upload from disk uploader.upload StringIO.new("file content") # upload from memory uploader.upload ActionDispatch::Http::UploadedFile.new(...) # upload from Rails controller uploader.upload Shrine.rack_file({ tempfile: tempfile }) # upload from Rack controller uploader.upload Rack::Test::UploadedFile.new(...) # upload from rack-test uploader.upload Down.open("https://example.org/file") # upload from internet uploader.upload Shrine::UploadedFile.new(...) # upload from Shrine storage

Uploaded file​

The Shrine::UploadedFile object represents the file that was uploaded to a storage, and it's what's returned from Shrine#upload or when retrieving a record attachment.

uploader.upload(file) #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile ...> (uploader) photo.image #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile ...> (attachment) attacher.file #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile ...> (attacher)

An uploaded file object contains the following data:

KeyDescription
idlocation of the file on the storage
storageidentifier of the storage the file was uploaded to
metadatafile metadata that was extracted before upload
uploaded_file #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile id="949sdjg834.jpg" storage=:store metadata={...}>  uploaded_file.id #=> "949sdjg834.jpg" uploaded_file.storage_key #=> :store uploaded_file.storage #=> #<Shrine::Storage::S3> uploaded_file.metadata #=> {...}

It comes with many convenient methods that delegate to the storage:

uploaded_file.url #=> "https://my-bucket.s3.amazonaws.com/949sdjg834.jpg" uploaded_file.open { |io| ... } # opens the uploaded file stream uploaded_file.download { |file| ... } # downloads the uploaded file to disk uploaded_file.stream(destination) # streams uploaded content into a writable destination uploaded_file.exists? #=> true uploaded_file.delete # deletes the uploaded file from the storage

It also implements the IO-like interface that conforms to Shrine's IO abstraction, which allows it to be uploaded again to other storages.

uploaded_file.read # returns content of the uploaded file uploaded_file.eof? # returns true if the whole IO was read uploaded_file.rewind # rewinds the IO uploaded_file.close # closes the IO

For more details, see the Retrieving Uploads guide and Shrine::UploadedFile API docs.

Attaching​

To attach uploaded files to database records, Shrine offers an attachment interface built on top of uploaders and uploaded files. There are integrations for various persistence libraries (ActiveRecord, Sequel, ROM, Hanami, Mongoid), but you can also attach files to plain structs (mutable or immutable).

Shrine.plugin :sequel # :activerecord

Attachment module​

The easiest way to attach files is with the Shrine::Attachment module:

class Photo < Sequel::Model # ActiveRecord::Base  include ImageUploader::Attachment.new(:image) #  include ImageUploader::Attachment[:image] # use your preferred syntax  include ImageUploader::Attachment(:image) # end

The included module will add attachment methods for the specified attribute:

MethodDescription
#image=uploads the file to temporary storage and serializes the result into image_data
#imagereturns Shrine::UploadedFile instantiated from image_data
#image_urlcalls url on the attachment if it's present, otherwise returns nil
#image_attacherreturns instance of Shrine::Attacher which handles the attaching

The persistence plugin we loaded will add callbacks that ensure cached files are automatically promoted to permanent storage on when record is saved, and that attachments are deleted when the record is destroyed.

# no file is attached photo.image #=> nil  # the assigned file is cached to temporary storage and written to `image_data` column photo.image = File.open("waterfall.jpg", "rb") photo.image #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile ...> photo.image_url #=> "/uploads/cache/0sdfllasfi842.jpg" photo.image_data #=> '{"id":"0sdfllasfi842.jpg","storage":"cache","metadata":{...}}'  # the cached file is promoted to permanent storage and saved to `image_data` column photo.save photo.image #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile ...> photo.image_url #=> "/uploads/store/l02kladf8jlda.jpg" photo.image_data #=> '{"id":"l02kladf8jlda.jpg","storage":"store","metadata":{...}}'  # the attached file is deleted with the record photo.destroy photo.image.exists? #=> false

If there is already a file attached and a new file is attached, the previous attachment will get deleted when the record gets saved.

photo.update(image: new_file) # changes the attachment and deletes previous photo.update(image: nil) # removes the attachment and deletes previous

Attacher​

The methods and callbacks added by the Shrine::Attachment module just delegate the behaviour to an underlying Shrine::Attacher object.

photo.image_attacher #=> #<Shrine::Attacher>

The Shrine::Attacher object can be instantiated and used directly:

attacher = ImageUploader::Attacher.from_model(photo, :image)  attacher.assign(file) # equivalent to `photo.image = file` attacher.file # equivalent to `photo.image` attacher.url # equivalent to `photo.image_url`

The attacher is what drives attaching files to model instances; you can use it as a more explicit alternative to models' attachment interface, or when you need something that's not available through the attachment methods.

See Using Attacher guide for more details.

Temporary storage​

Shrine uses temporary storage to support file validation and direct uploads. If you don't need these features, you can tell Shrine to upload files directly to permanent storage:

Shrine.plugin :model, cache: false
photo.image = File.open("waterfall.jpg", "rb") photo.image.storage_key #=> :store

If you're using the attacher directly, you can just use Attacher#attach instead of Attacher#assign:

attacher.attach File.open("waterfall.jpg", "rb") attacher.file.storage_key #=> :store

Plugin system​

By default, Shrine comes with a small core which provides only the essential functionality. All additional features are available via plugins, which also ship with Shrine. This way you can choose exactly what and how much Shrine does for you, and you load the code only for features that you use.

Shrine.plugin :instrumentation # adds instrumentation

Plugins add behaviour by extending Shrine core classes via module inclusion, and many of them also accept configuration options. The plugin system respects inheritance, so you can choose to load a plugin globally or per uploader.

class ImageUploader < Shrine  plugin :store_dimensions # extract image dimensions only for this uploader and its descendants end

If you want to extend Shrine functionality with custom behaviour, you can also create your own plugin. There are also additional external plugins created by others.

NOTE: An uploader class will inherit a copy of current superclass' plugin options at the time of subclassing. This means you should not load additional plugins on a superclass after the subclass has already been created, because new options will not get applied to the subclass, which can result in errors.

Metadata​

Shrine automatically extracts some basic file metadata and saves them to the Shrine::UploadedFile. You can access them through the #metadata hash or via metadata methods:

uploaded_file.metadata #=> # { # "filename" => "matrix.mp4", # "mime_type" => "video/mp4", # "size" => 345993, # }  uploaded_file.original_filename #=> "matrix.mp4" uploaded_file.extension #=> "mp4" uploaded_file.mime_type #=> "video/mp4" uploaded_file.size #=> 345993

MIME type​

By default, mime_type metadata will be set from the #content_type attribute of the uploaded file (if it exists), which is generally not secure and will trigger a warning. You can load the determine_mime_type plugin to have MIME type extracted from file content instead.

# Gemfile gem "marcel", "~> 0.3"
Shrine.plugin :determine_mime_type, analyzer: :marcel
photo = Photo.new(image: StringIO.new("<?php ... ?>")) photo.image.mime_type #=> "application/x-php"

Other metadata​

In addition to basic metadata, you can also extract image dimensions, calculate signatures, and in general extract any custom metadata. Check out the Extracting Metadata guide for more details.

Processing​

Shrine allows you to process attached files both "eagerly" and "on-the-fly". For example, if your app is accepting image uploads, you can generate a predefined set of thumbnails when the image is attached to a record, or you can have thumbnails generated dynamically as they're needed.

For image processing, it's recommended to use the ImageProcessing gem, which is a high-level wrapper for processing with MiniMagick and libvips.

$ brew install imagemagick vips

Eager processing​

We can use the derivatives plugin to generate a pre-defined set of processed files (e.g. image thumbnails). We do this by registering a derivatives processor block and then explicitly triggering creation:

# Gemfile gem "image_processing", "~> 1.8"
Shrine.plugin :derivatives, create_on_promote: true
require "image_processing/mini_magick"  class ImageUploader < Shrine  Attacher.derivatives do |original|  magick = ImageProcessing::MiniMagick.source(original)   {  large: magick.resize_to_limit!(800, 800),  medium: magick.resize_to_limit!(500, 500),  small: magick.resize_to_limit!(300, 300),  }  end end
photo = Photo.new(image: file) photo.save # automatically creates derivatives on promotion

You can then retrieve the URL of a processed derivative:

photo.image_url(:large) #=> "https://s3.amazonaws.com/path/to/large.jpg"

The derivatives data is stored in the <attachment>_data column, and you can retrieve them as Shrine::UploadedFile objects:

photo.image(:large) #=> #<Shrine::UploadedFile id="path/to/large.jpg" storage=:store metadata={...}> photo.image(:large).url #=> "https://s3.amazonaws.com/path/to/large.jpg" photo.image(:large).size #=> 5825949 photo.image(:large).mime_type #=> "image/jpeg"

For more details, see the File Processing guide and the derivatives plugin documentation.

On-the-fly processing​

On-the-fly processing is provided by the derivation_endpoint plugin. To set it up, we configure the plugin with a secret key and a path prefix, mount its Rack app in our routes on the configured path prefix, and define processing we want to perform:

# Gemfile gem "image_processing", "~> 1.8"
# config/initializers/rails.rb (Rails) # ... Shrine.plugin :derivation_endpoint, secret_key: "<YOUR_SECRET_KEY>"
require "image_processing/mini_magick"  class ImageUploader < Shrine  plugin :derivation_endpoint, prefix: "derivations/image" # matches mount point   derivation :thumbnail do |file, width, height|  ImageProcessing::MiniMagick  .source(file)  .resize_to_limit!(width.to_i, height.to_i)  end end
# config/routes.rb (Rails) Rails.application.routes.draw do  # ...  mount ImageUploader.derivation_endpoint => "/derivations/image" end

Now we can generate URLs from attached files that will perform the desired processing:

photo.image.derivation_url(:thumbnail, 600, 400) #=> "/derivations/image/thumbnail/600/400/eyJpZCI6ImZvbyIsInN0b3JhZ2UiOiJzdG9yZSJ9?signature=..."

The on-the-fly processing feature is highly customizable, see the derivation_endpoint plugin documentation for more details.

Validation​

The validation plugin allows performing validation for attached files. For common validations, the validation_helpers plugin provides useful validators for built in metadata:

Shrine.plugin :validation_helpers
class DocumentUploader < Shrine  Attacher.validate do  validate_max_size 5*1024*1024, message: "is too large (max is 5 MB)"  validate_mime_type %w[application/pdf]  end end
user = User.new user.cv = File.open("cv.pdf", "rb") user.valid? #=> false user.errors.to_hash #=> {:cv=>["is too large (max is 5 MB)"]}

For more details, see the File Validation guide and validation_helpers plugin docs.

Location​

Shrine automatically generates random locations before uploading files. By default, the hierarchy is flat, meaning all files are stored in the root directory of the storage.

024d9fe83bf4fafb.jpg
768a336bf54de219.jpg
adfaa363629f7fc5.png
...

The pretty_location plugin provides a good default hierarchy:

Shrine.plugin :pretty_location
user/
 564/
 avatar/
 aa3e0cd715.jpg
 thumb-493g82jf23.jpg
photo/
 123/
 image/
 13f8a7bc18.png
 thumb-9be62da67e.png
...

But you can also override Shrine#generate_location with a custom implementation, for example:

class ImageUploader < Shrine  def generate_location(io, record: nil, derivative: nil, **)  return super unless record   table = record.class.table_name  id = record.id  prefix = derivative || "original"   "uploads/#{table}/#{id}/#{prefix}-#{super}"  end end
uploads/
 photos/
 123/
 original-afe929b8b4.jpg
 small-ad61f25883.jpg
 medium-41b75c42bb.jpg
 large-73e67abe50.jpg
...

There should always be a random component in the location, so that the ORM dirty tracking is detected properly.

The Shrine#generate_location method contains a lot of useful context for the upcoming upload:

class ImageUploader < Shrine  def generate_location(io, record: nil, name: nil, derivative: nil, metadata: {}, **options)  storage_key #=> :cache, :store, ...  io #=> #<File>, #<Shrine::UploadedFile>, ...  record #=> #<Photo>, #<User>, ...  name #=> :image, :avatar, ...  derivative #=> :small, :medium, :large, ... (derivatives plugin)  metadata #=> { "filename" => "nature.jpg", "mime_type" => "image/jpeg", "size" => 18573, ... }  options #=> { ... other uploader options ... }   # ...  end end

Direct uploads​

To improve the user experience, it's recommended to upload files asynchronously as soon as the user selects them. The direct uploads would go to temporary storage, just like in the synchronous flow. Then, instead of attaching a raw file to your model, you assign the cached file JSON data.

# in the regular synchronous flow photo.image = file  # in the direct upload flow photo.image = '{"id":"...","storage":"cache","metadata":{...}}'

On the client side it's highly recommended to use Uppy, a very flexible modern JavaScript file upload library that happens to integrate nicely with Shrine.

Simple direct upload​

The simplest approach is to upload directly to an endpoint in your app, which forwards uploads to the specified storage. The upload_endpoint Shrine plugin provides a mountable Rack app that implements this endpoint:

Shrine.plugin :upload_endpoint
# config/routes.rb (Rails) Rails.application.routes.draw do  # ...  mount Shrine.upload_endpoint(:cache) => "/upload" # POST /upload end

Then you can configure Uppy's XHR Upload plugin to upload to this endpoint. See this walkthrough for adding simple direct uploads from scratch, it includes a complete JavaScript example (there is also the Roda / Rails demo app).

Presigned direct upload​

For better performance, you can also upload files directly to your cloud storage service (AWS S3, Google Cloud Storage etc). For this, your temporary storage needs to be your cloud service:

require "shrine/storage/s3"  Shrine.storages = {  cache: Shrine::Storage::S3.new(prefix: "cache", **s3_options),  store: Shrine::Storage::S3.new(**s3_options) }

In this flow, the client needs to first fetch upload parameters from the server, and then use these parameters for the upload to the cloud service. The presign_endpoint Shrine plugin provides a mountable Rack app that generates upload parameters:

Shrine.plugin :presign_endpoint
# config/routes.rb (Rails) Rails.application.routes.draw do  # ...  mount Shrine.presign_endpoint(:cache) => "/s3/params" # GET /s3/params end

Then you can configure Uppy's AWS S3 plugin to fetch params from your endpoint before uploading to S3. See this walkthrough for adding direct uploads to S3 from scratch, it includes a complete JavaScript example (there is also the Roda / Rails demo). See also the Direct Uploads to S3 guide for more details.

Resumable direct upload​

If your app is accepting large uploads, you can improve resilience by making the uploads resumable. This can significantly improve experience for users on slow and flaky internet connections.

Uppy S3 Multipart​

You can achieve resumable uploads directly to S3 with the AWS S3 Multipart Uppy plugin, accompanied with uppy_s3_multipart Shrine plugin provided by the uppy-s3_multipart gem.

# Gemfile gem "uppy-s3_multipart", "~> 0.3"
Shrine.plugin :uppy_s3_multipart
# config/routes.rb (Rails) Rails.application.routes.draw do  # ...  mount Shrine.uppy_s3_multipart(:cache) => "/s3/multipart" end

See the uppy-s3_multipart docs for more details.

Tus protocol​

If you want a more generic approach, you can build your resumable uploads on tus – an open resumable upload protocol. On the server side you can use the tus-ruby-server gem, on the client side Uppy's Tus plugin, and the shrine-tus gem for the glue.

# Gemfile gem "tus-server", "~> 2.0" gem "shrine-tus", "~> 2.1"
require "shrine/storage/tus"  Shrine.storages = {  cache: Shrine::Storage::Tus.new, # tus server acts as temporary storage  store: ..., # your permanent storage }
# config/routes.rb (Rails) Rails.application.routes.draw do  # ...  mount Tus::Server => "/files" end

See this walkthrough for adding tus-powered resumable uploads from scratch, it includes a complete JavaScript example (there is also a demo app). See also shrine-tus and tus-ruby-server docs for more details.

Backgrounding​

The backgrounding plugin allows you to move file promotion and deletion into a background job, using the backgrounding library of your choice:

Shrine.plugin :backgrounding Shrine::Attacher.promote_block do  PromoteJob.perform_async(self.class.name, record.class.name, record.id, name, file_data) end Shrine::Attacher.destroy_block do  DestroyJob.perform_async(self.class.name, data) end
class PromoteJob  include Sidekiq::Worker   def perform(attacher_class, record_class, record_id, name, file_data)  attacher_class = Object.const_get(attacher_class)  record = Object.const_get(record_class).find(record_id) # if using Active Record   attacher = attacher_class.retrieve(model: record, name: name, file: file_data)  attacher.atomic_promote  rescue Shrine::AttachmentChanged, ActiveRecord::RecordNotFound  # attachment has changed or the record has been deleted, nothing to do  end end
class DestroyJob  include Sidekiq::Worker   def perform(attacher_class, data)  attacher_class = Object.const_get(attacher_class)   attacher = attacher_class.from_data(data)  attacher.destroy  end end

Clearing cache​

Shrine doesn't automatically delete files uploaded to temporary storage, instead you should set up a separate recurring task that will automatically delete old cached files.

Most Shrine storage classes come with a #clear! method, which you can call in a recurring script. For FileSystem and S3 storage it would look like this:

# FileSystem storage file_system = Shrine.storages[:cache] file_system.clear! { |path| path.mtime < Time.now - 7*24*60*60 } # delete files older than 1 week
# S3 storage s3 = Shrine.storages[:cache] s3.clear! { |object| object.last_modified < Time.now - 7*24*60*60 } # delete files older than 1 week

For S3, it may be easier and cheaper to use S3 bucket lifecycle expiration rules instead.

Logging​

The instrumentation plugin sends and logs events for important operations:

Shrine.plugin :instrumentation, notifications: ActiveSupport::Notifications  uploaded_file = Shrine.upload(io, :store) uploaded_file.exists? uploaded_file.download uploaded_file.delete
Metadata (32ms) – {:storage=>:store, :io=>StringIO, :uploader=>Shrine}
Upload (1523ms) – {:storage=>:store, :location=>"ed0e30ddec8b97813f2c1f4cfd1700b4", :io=>StringIO, :upload_options=>{}, :uploader=>Shrine}
Exists (755ms) – {:storage=>:store, :location=>"ed0e30ddec8b97813f2c1f4cfd1700b4", :uploader=>Shrine}
Download (1002ms) – {:storage=>:store, :location=>"ed0e30ddec8b97813f2c1f4cfd1700b4", :download_options=>{}, :uploader=>Shrine}
Delete (700ms) – {:storage=>:store, :location=>"ed0e30ddec8b97813f2c1f4cfd1700b4", :uploader=>Shrine}

Some plugins add their own instrumentation as well when they detect that the instrumentation plugin has been loaded. For that to work, the instrumentation plugin needs to be loaded before any of these plugins.

PluginInstrumentation
derivation_endpointinstruments file processing
derivativesinstruments file processing
determine_mime_typeinstruments analyzing MIME type
store_dimensionsinstruments extracting image dimensions
signatureinstruments calculating signature
infer_extensioninstruments inferring extension
remote_urlinstruments remote URL downloading
data_uriinstruments data URI parsing

For instrumentation, warnings, and other logging, Shrine uses its internal logger. You can tell Shrine to use a different logger. For example, if you're using Rails, you might want to tell it to use the Rails logger:

Shrine.logger = Rails.logger

In tests you might want to tell Shrine to log only warnings:

Shrine.logger.level = Logger::WARN