How to bypass the Firebase cache to refresh data (in Android app)?

A workaround I discovered is using Firebase's runTransaction() method. This appears to always retrieve data from the server.

String firebaseUrl = "/some/user/datapath/";
final Firebase firebaseClient = new Firebase(firebaseUrl);

    // Use runTransaction to bypass cached DataSnapshot
    firebaseClient.runTransaction(new Transaction.Handler() {
        @Override
        public Transaction.Result doTransaction(MutableData mutableData) {
            // Return passed in data
            return Transaction.success(mutableData);
        }

        @Override
        public void onComplete(FirebaseError firebaseError, boolean success, DataSnapshot dataSnapshot) {
            if (firebaseError != null || !success || dataSnapshot == null) {
              System.out.println("Failed to get DataSnapshot");
            } else {
              System.out.println("Successfully get DataSnapshot");
              //handle data here
            }
        }
    });

This was a problem that was causing me a lot of stress in my application too.

I tried everything, from changing .addListenerForSingleValueEvent() to .addValueEventListener() to trying to creatively use .keepSynced() to using a delay (the Thread.sleep() method you have described above) and nothing really worked consistently (even the Thread.sleep() method, which wasn't really acceptable in a production app didn't give me consistent results).

So what I did was this: after creating a Query object and calling .keepSynced() on it, I then proceed to write a mock/token object in the node I'm querying and THEN in that operation's completion listener, I do the data retrieval I want to do, after deleting the mock object.

Something like:

 MockObject mock = new MockObject();
    mock.setIdentifier("delete!");

    final Query query = firebase.child("node1").child("node2");

    query.keepSynced(true);

    firebase.child("node1").child("node2").child("refreshMock")
            .setValue(mock, new CompletionListener() {

                @Override
                public void onComplete(FirebaseError error, Firebase afb) {

                    query.addListenerForSingleValueEvent(new ValueEventListener() {

                        public void onDataChange(DataSnapshot data) {

                            // get identifier and recognise that this data
                            // shouldn't be used
                            // it's also probably a good idea to remove the
                            // mock object
                            // using the removeValue() method in its
                            // speficic node so
                            // that the database won't be saddled with a new
                            // one in every
                            // read operation

                        }

                        public void onCancelled(FirebaseError error) {
                        }

                    });

                }

            });
}

This has worked consistently so far for me! (well, for a day or so, so take this with a grain of salt). It seems like doing a write operation before reading somehow bypasses the cache, which makes sense. So the data comes back fresh.

The only downside is the extra write operation before the read operation, which may cause a small delay (obviously use a small object) but if that's the price for always fresh data, I'll take it!

Hope this helps!

My Solution was to call Database.database().isPersistenceEnabled = true on load up, then call .keepSynced(true) on any nodes that I needed refreshed.

The issue here is that if you query your node right after .keepSynced(true) then you're likely to get the cache rather than the fresh data. Slightly lame but functional work around: delay your query of the node for a second or so in order to give Firebase some time to get the new data. You'll get the cache instead if the user is offline.

Oh, and if it's a node that you don't want to keep up to date in the background forever, remember to call .keepSynced(false) when you're done.