Simple example showing how to monkey patch ActiveRecord to allow database switching

shards.rb

# Define some required dependencies
require "bundler/inline"
gemfile(false) do
  source "https://rubygems.org"
  gem "activerecord", "~> 4.2.8"
  gem "sqlite3"
end

require "active_record"

class User < ActiveRecord::Base
end

DatabaseModel = Struct.new(:name) do
  def superclass
    ActiveRecord::Base
  end
end

# Setup database connections and create databases if not present
connection_handler = ActiveRecord::ConnectionAdapters::ConnectionHandler.new
resolver = ActiveRecord::ConnectionAdapters::ConnectionSpecification::Resolver.new({
  "users_shard_1" => { adapter: "sqlite3", database: "users_shard_1.sqlite3" },
  "users_shard_2" => { adapter: "sqlite3", database: "users_shard_2.sqlite3" }
})

databases = %w{users_shard_1 users_shard_2}
databases.each do |database|
  filename = "#{database}.sqlite3"

  ActiveRecord::Base.establish_connection({
    adapter: "sqlite3",
    database: filename
  })

  spec = resolver.spec(database.to_sym)
  connection_handler.establish_connection(DatabaseModel.new(database), spec)

  next if File.exists?(filename)

  ActiveRecord::Schema.define(version: 1) do
    create_table :users do |t|
      t.string :name
      t.string :email
    end
  end
end

# Create custom connection handler
class ShardHandler
  def initialize(original_handler)
    @original_handler = original_handler
  end

  def use_database(name)
    @model= DatabaseModel.new(name)
  end

  def retrieve_connection_pool(klass)
    @original_handler.retrieve_connection_pool(@model)
  end

  def retrieve_connection(klass)
    pool = retrieve_connection_pool(klass)
    raise ConnectionNotEstablished, "No connection pool for #{klass}" unless pool
    conn = pool.connection
    raise ConnectionNotEstablished, "No connection for #{klass} in connection pool" unless conn
    puts "Using database \"#{conn.instance_variable_get("@config")[:database]}\" (##{conn.object_id})"
    conn
  end
end

User.connection_handler = ShardHandler.new(connection_handler)

User.connection_handler.use_database("users_shard_1")
User.create(name: "John Doe", email: "john.doe@example.org")
puts User.count

User.connection_handler.use_database("users_shard_2")
User.create(name: "Jane Doe", email: "jane.doe@example.org")
puts User.count

User.connection_handler.use_database("users_shard_1")
puts User.count