Help requested with CE Cache cache-breaking rules

Question

I have a large site that uses Structure for most of the static page content. I'm also using CE Cache for performance on those pages since some of them are pretty complicated and heavy.

I'm using the database driver.

Since the content doesn't change very frequently I have the cache set to never refresh. So far I've been forced to manually clear the cache for a specific content path since clearing the entire site cache just for one small section of the site seemed wasteful.

Since the site's secondary navigation shows the current section's pages and immediate siblings, the cache would need to be flushed for the current section as well as one level up just in case the structure URL changes. (see screenshot)

Is there a way to configure Cache Breaking in such a way that I can automatically clear all pages that are siblings as well as the immediate parents and their siblings?

Answer 1

I think the best way to approach this is to tag the caches with their sibling ids. Structure actually makes this quite easy, because of its global variables:

{exp:ce_cache:it tags="{structure:sibling_ids}|{structure:page:entry_id}"}
    {exp:channel:entries limit="1" ...}
        ...
        {exp:ce_cache:add_tag}{entry_id}{/exp:ce_cache:add_tag}
    {/exp:channel:entries}
{/exp:ce_cache:it}

Answer 2

Complicated question, Ian, especially since you have Structure involved.

I think I'd want to talk with Aaron Waldron directly -- some basis below.

• the primary ability of CE Cache is to break on change or addition/deletion action within a channel. You can then target what might be broken as a result.
• you can of course break the entire channel. A tricky part here is what this may actually mean. CE Cache appears to break according to the apparent path -- template group/template. I am not sure if the original EE path isn't still available and used with Structure, but there are other implications.
• The rules you can set for CE Cache appear I think only on the add-on module's Cache Breaking page for the individual channel involved. And that emphasizes that you can only condition a cache break on channel changes.
• thus I think that to do something as you would like to do, it would be a non-trivial addition to CE Cache capabilities - both to trigger on path rather than channel, and then to identify at least a partial path per each such rule to break.

I'm thinking then that depending on what Structure's effects are, you may be just as well to break the channel/s holding all the items. You have the auto-rebuilding options at the top of the cache breaking page to get the full cache rebuilt in some sensible interval - see the notes for tradeoffs and times there.

I had a brief look at Template Morsels, but didn't spot anything more helpful there, and with those, I think you are required to do a lot of modifying of your template code, which is not needed in the default use of CE Cache, though it's fully capable of spot caching also.

Hope this view helps the thinking, anyway. I'd talk to Aaron...

Answer 3

How about escaping the secondary navigation so it's not cached at all?

     {exp:ce_cache:escape}
     Structure navigation here
     {/exp:ce_cache:escape}