# the following code, or similar, will detect whether memcached is running
# and, iff so, use that for the Rails.cache.  it gracefully falls back to
# using the built in MemoryStore if memcached is not running
#
  has_memcached =
    begin
      MemCache.new('localhost').get('42')
      true
    rescue Object => e
      Rails.logger.error e
      Rails.logger.warn "** NO MEMCACHED FOUND **"
      false
    end

  if has_memcached
    cache = ActiveSupport::Cache.lookup_store(:mem_cache_store)
    Object.send(:remove_const, "RAILS_CACHE")
    Object.send(:const_set, "RAILS_CACHE", cache)
    ActionController::Base.cache_store = cache
  end