I'm working on a IOT project, where we are evaluating to use firebase. We have a prototype implemented which works fine for real time data. Since the data is critical for client they want to be able to retrieve the data at later point of date. I couldn't find much about a persistent storage in the firebase website, any of you have idea on if we can use firebase alone or do we need to transfer it to you a cloud based store like google cloud store, if so what is the reliable time for which firebase will hold the data. Assuming you choose the right plan.
Thanks
Kamal
Firebase is a persistent database. While you certainly can setup a way to transfer the data to an archive, if you structure your data correctly, there shouldn't be any need to do so. You haven't really indicated what those requirements are, however, so it is difficult to thoroughly answer your question. (If you have one.)
There have been several demonstrations of using Firebase as part of an IoT infrastructure. Consider, for example this presentation by Jenny Tong (#mimming) about doing exactly this.
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I know that I could implement a counter in my application but using an api would still be a cleaner solution - if one exists?
Basically, Firestore has Spark free tier limits (think 50,000 reads/day) that I don't want to exceed. So whenever my app was going to do firestore reads, I would like a way to simply ask firestore whether I'm over a certain number.
I'm also reading that Google intentionally got rid of Firebase spending limits.. which seems really sketchy... Impossible to set the Cloud Firebase daily spending limit
There is no such API as part of Firebase. The ways to monitor usage are documented here, but none of them is an API.
You might be able to get some data through the Cloud Monitoring API. But this API isn't made for client-side access though, so you'll have to wrap it yourself.
A final alternative would be to look at a service like https://firerun.io/ who automate a lot of this.
I am using Firebase as my authentication and database platform in my React Native-Expo app. I have not yet decided if I will be using the realtime-database or Firestore database.
I need to perform statistical analysis on daily data gathered from my users, which is stored in the database. I.e. the users type in their daily intake of protein, from it I would like to calculate their weekly average, expected monthly average, provide suggestions of types of food if protein intake is too low and etc.
What would be the best approach in order to achieve the result wanted in my specific situation?
I am really unfamiliar and stepping into uncharted territory regarding on how I can accomplish this. I have read that Firebase Analytics generates different basic analytics regarding usage of the app, number crash-free users etc. But can it perform analytics on custom events? Can I create a custom event for Firebase analytics to keep track of a certain node in my database, and output analytics from that? And then of course, if yes, does it work with React Native-Expo or do I need to detach from Expo? In addition, I have read that Firebase Analytics can be combined with Google BigQuery. Would this be an alternative for my case?
Are there any other ways of performing such data analysis on my data stored in Firebase database? For example, export the data and use Python and SciKit Learn?
Whatever opinion or advice you may have, I would be grateful if you could share it!
You're not alone - many people building web apps on GCP have this question, and there is no single answer.
I'm not too familiar with Firebase Analytics, but can answer the question for Firestore and for your custom analytics (e.g. weekly avg protein consumption)
The first thing to point out is that Firestore, unlike other NoSQL databases, is storage only. You can't perform aggregations in real time like you can with MongoDB, so the calculations have to be done somewhere else.
The best practice recommended by GCP in this case is indeed to do a regular export of your Firestore data into BQ (BigQuery), and you can run analytical calculations there in the meantime. You could also, when a user inputs some data, send that to Pub/Sub and use one of GCP Dataflow's streaming templates to stream the data into BQ, and have everything in near real time.
Here's the issue with that however: while this solution gives you real time, and is very scalable, it gets expensive fast, and if you're more used to Python than SQL to run analytics it can be a steep learning curve. Here's an alternative I've used for smaller webapps, which scales well for <100k users and costs <$20 a month on GCP's current pricing:
Write a Python script that grabs the data from Firestore (using the Firestore Python SDK), generates the analytics you need on it, and writes the results back to a Firestore collection
Create an endpoint for that function using Flask or Django
Deploy that server application on Cloud Run, preventing unauthenticated invocations (you'll only be calling it from within GCP) - see this article, steps 1 and 2 only. You can also deploy the Python script(s) to GCP's Vertex AI or hosted Jupyter notebooks if you're more comfortable with that
Use Cloud Scheduler to call that function every x minutes - see these docs for authentication
Have your React app query the "analytics results" collection to get the results
My solution is a FlutterWeb based Dashboard that displays relevant data in (near) realtime like the Regular Flutter IOS/Android app and likewise some aggregated data.
The aggregated data is compiled using a few nodejs based triggers in the database that does any analytic lifting and hence is also near realtime. If you study pricing you will learn, that function invocations are pretty cheap unless of-course you happen to make a 'desphew' :)
I came up with a great solution.
I used the inbuilt firebase BigQuery plugin. Then I used Cube.js (deployed on GCP - cloud run on docker) on top of bigquery.
Cube.js just makes everything just so easy. You do need to make a manual query It tries to do optimize queries. On top of that, it uses caching so you won't get big bills on GCP. I think this is the best solution I was able to find. And this is infinitely scalable and totally real-time.
Also if you are a small startup then it is mostly free with GCP - free limits on cloud run and BigQuery.
Note:- This is not affiliated in any way with cubejs.
I've never used Firebase (or Firestore) before and I'm considering using it for my new mobile application. And I'm wondering if using Firebase only, without any additional server is a good idea. Firestore does a lot of things I guess, like authentication, security and scalability. So I really hesitate putting an another server into Architecture. But I have a plan to do many server-side stuffs like searching for text or calculating something.
I think the answer is "it depends", but I want to hear some advices from people who have used Firebase before about this topic. Thank you in advance!
Is it a good idea to use an additional server with Google Firebase?
Firebase will help you build apps fast, without managing infrastructure. So you'll be able to focus on your app development and not on how to maintain servers. Perhaps, if you have requirments that Firebase cannot handle, which I doubt it, you can use an additional server.
I've never used Google Firebase (or Firestore) before and I'm considering using it for my new mobile application.
If you have never used the Firebase suite, I recommend you get started by reading the official documentation. Before starting to use Cloud Firestore, I recommend first get more familiar with NoSQL databases.
And I'm wondering if using Firebase only, without any additional server is a good idea.
There are many apps out there that are not using any other server than Firebase.
Firestore does a lot of things I guess, like authentication, security and scalability.
Firestore is a scalable NoSQL cloud database that allow you to store and sync data for client- and server-side development. It does not authenticate users. For that, there is another product named Firebase Authentication that I encourage you to use it.
But I have a plan to do many server-side stuffs like searching for text or calculating something.
Here you can find more details about Firestore search options. Regarding calculations, you can do pretty much everything you can do in a regular SQL database.
I am considering firebase for an app - mainly for the real-time but other features like the analytics and authentication (and price) are other bonuses.
I have my own database and I want everything saved in there. Firebase will have a small portion of the dataset I push as it's needed.
So I'm basically thinking that the firebase data will be read only to the users. If a user comments, that will actually go to my server, I'll authenticate, clean, whatever.. and push to the that feed.
Are there problems with this approach? Are there other (better) ways to solve the problem?
This is a completely valid approach. Firebase is designed so you can use specific features that suit your needs.
I've been reading about Firebase and playing with it for a short while. The idea (BAAS) and implementation are impressive, and having programmed with Javascript it seems a viable choice. Not having to deal with scaling and other server side concerns makes it even more attractive.
My question is: generally speaking, is Firebase a first class back-end candidate for any average data-based application? e.g. billing, CRM, e-commerce, social, location based, etc. I do not include super light or heavy extremes such as a basic chat, or a nuclear plant monitor...
The answer may not be a clear yes/no, but was it built to support the general application space, or just stand out as a real-time read/write data service?
Would appreciate answers based on experience and existing production applications.
Thanks
Yes, Firebase is intended to be a first class back-end for any data based Web, iOS or Android application. The service offers real-time data reads and writes, but also comes with a powerful and flexible security system that allows you to write secure client-only apps, without needing any server code to enforce data boundaries.
There are several apps in production listed on the front page as customer and on the app showcase page on https://firebase.google.com/customers/
Firebase is now more capable and is considered as a full stand-alone back-end, especially after the introduction of cloud function. https://firebase.google.com/docs/functions/
Firebase may not have support for transaction spanning multiple business objects.
e.g. When a sales order is booked then it needs to update inventory for multiple items, update billing in receivables, give sales credit to multiple sales persons etc.
Firebase team is supposed to come up with a database trigger option which will make all these happen.