Caching Rateflex

Rateflex is a lightweight Python-based app that serves as a proxy to support developers working with rate-limited third-party APIs. It allows developers to program against these APIs without being hindered by rate limitations. Rateflex intercepts all requests and either responds with cached data or forwards the request to the target host if it hasn't been previously cached.

Running Rateflex

Docker

The easiest way to get started with Rateflex is by using the prebuilt Docker image. Use the following command to start the app on port 5000:

docker run -p "5000:5000" neilblaze/rateflex

If you want to use a local session file you must mount it to the container:

docker run -p "5000:5000" -v "/tmp/cache.session:/cache.session" neilblaze/rateflex

From source

You can also run Rateflex from the source code. After cloning the repository on local, install the required dependencies:

pip install -r requirements.txt

Then start the proxy:

python3 proxy.py

Usage

Once Rateflex is up and running, you can use it by appending http://localhost:5000 to your original API requests. For example, if your original request is:

curl https://api.example.com/users

Your new request would be like this:

curl http://localhost:5000/https://api.example.com/users

Why Use Rateflex?

Rateflex is designed to overcome rate limitations imposed by third-party APIs during development. It allows developers to send multiple requests without getting temporarily blocked, which can significantly impact productivity. By caching responses, Rateflex can serve previously fetched data instead of making additional requests to the target API.

Supported Use Cases

Rateflex is suitable for most API calls. It is primarily focused on handling text-based payloads and may not handle binary responses (e.g., images) as effectively. However, the app may introduce binary support in future updates.

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Contributing 🙌

We welcome contributions to Rateflex! If you have any changes or new features to propose, you can:

• Build the changes yourself and create a pull request (we appreciate it!)
• Create an issue to describe your desired modifications or additions in detail.

TODO ⏳

• Enhance cache strategies to optimize performance and efficiency (current implementation based on HTTP method and URL)