Please advise...Install Ruby from Debian Package or Source?

[Thursday]

I'd like to install Ruby on a Debian server.

Is it better to install the latest stable snapshot or install the Debian
package? What are the pros and cons?

I noticed the Debian package for Ruby is split up into numerous
packages. I don't mind this but I'm wondering how often the Debian Ruby
package will be updated with fixes from Ruby 1.8.2 branch.

And I'm not sure how Debian's Ruby package corresponds (if at all) to a
stable snapshot. For example, the current package is 1.8.2 2004-12-06
which is after preview3--and I'm not sure if it is a stable snapshot
from 12-06 or if that date is the date of the Debian package.

I'm also wondering if there are any problems caused by using Debian's
Ruby package with something like RubyGems where one doesn't know what
the other installed.

Any advice would be appreciated.

 

[Giovanni Intini]

On Ubuntu, a debian derived distribution I use this approach: apt-get
for everything available there, rubygems for the packages not
available in apt (rails and its dependencies so far).

The only annoyance is that you have to apt-get install lots of
packages when you first setup the machine because ruby is split in
several parts, other than that everything is fine.

 

[Stefan Schmiedl]

I'd like to install Ruby on a Debian server.

Is it better to install the latest stable snapshot or install the Debian
package? What are the pros and cons?

Some of them are:

if you install the package, you can install other packages
that depend on ruby.

if you tar-make-install the stable snapshot, the system
won't know that you have ruby installed.

packaged libraries are more convenient to install (which is equally
true for apt, gems and rpa)

For some time, I had a dual setup: packaged ruby below /usr
snapshot below /usr/local with PATH and #! preferring /usr/local.

I'm also wondering if there are any problems caused by using Debian's
Ruby package with something like RubyGems where one doesn't know what
the other installed.

you can confuse your system, if you install the same library twice
and remove one.

s.

 

[Michael DeHaan]

Debian does this with all languages, but it's very good in the long
run for doing so. There is little distinction between the stdlib and
other packages, and you upgrade all at will....

Perl is this way, Python is that way, etc. It's a little annoying
the first time you want to get Rails or something running but just
check each error message to find the missing deps...

 

[Adeodato Simó]

* Michael DeHaan [Sunday, December 19, 2004 00:42] {comp.lang.ruby}:

Debian does this with all languages, but it's very good in the long
run for doing so. There is little distinction between the stdlib and
other packages, and you upgrade all at will....

but having an easy way of installing all of those packages would be useful
for less experienced people. I can easily find out the list of such
packages, but I realize that may not be the case of other people.

for that purpose, I just submitted #286400 (http://bugs.debian.org/286400).

--
Adeodato Simó
EM: asp16 [ykwim] alu.ua.es | PK: DA6AE621
Listening to: Luke Vibert - 2001 beats

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