Rails console can't connect to database but rake tasks can

Question

I have a rails app that is using the one click DO image.

I can run any of the rake db:* successfully but when I run rails console I can't connect to the db.

How can I fix it? The app is working fine. So I think is a rails console problem.

Console output:

deployer:/home/rails$ RAILS_ENV=production bundle exec rake db:migrate
  ActiveRecord::SchemaMigration Load (3.2ms)  SELECT "schema_migrations".* FROM "schema_migrations"

deployer:/home/rails$ echo $APP_DATABASE_PASSWORD
[redacted database password]

deployer:/home/rails$ RAILS_ENV=production bundle exec rails console
Running via Spring preloader in process 25038
Loading production environment (Rails 4.2.6)
2.3.0 :001 > User.connection
PG::ConnectionBad: fe_sendauth: no password supplied

database.yml

default: &default
  adapter: postgresql
  encoding: unicode
  pool: 5
  host: localhost
  username: rails
  password: <%= ENV['APP_DATABASE_PASSWORD'] %>

production:
  <<: *default
  database: production
  username: rails
  password: <%= ENV['APP_DATABASE_PASSWORD'] %>

EDIT

Looking around I found that ActiveRecord::Base.configurations has password: nil. Why then the server process reads the password but console doesn't?

I added ActiveRecord::Base.configurations to an initializer. At initialization the password is present.

On console ActiveRecord::Base.configurations returns all the info as expected, except by the password. I even have reload the default vars with . /etc/defaults/unicorn

EDIT 2

ActiveRecord::Base.configurations on RAILS_ENV=production bundle exec rails console

{"default"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>nil},
 "development"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>nil,
   "database"=>"development"},
 "test"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>nil,
   "database"=>"test"},
 "production"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>nil,
   "database"=>"production"}}

ActiveRecord::Base.configurations on APP_DATABASE_PASSWORD=password RAILS_ENV=production bundle exec rails console

{"default"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>nil},
 "development"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>nil,
   "database"=>"development"},
 "test"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>nil,
   "database"=>"test"},
 "production"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>nil,
   "database"=>"production"}}

ActiveRecord::Base.configurations on RAILS_ENV=production bundle exec rails server

{"default"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>[password]},
 "development"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>[password],
   "database"=>"development"},
 "test"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>[password],
   "database"=>"test"},
 "production"=>
  {"adapter"=>"postgresql",
   "encoding"=>"unicode",
   "pool"=>5,
   "host"=>"localhost",
   "username"=>"rails",
   "password"=>[password],
   "database"=>"production"}}

Answer 1

It turns out that the important difference is the Spring preloader. It seems that you've started Spring before you've defined the ENV variable.

Try killing Spring and restarting the console.