I’ve been reading the various messages on how to distribute Ruby modules.
Well, here’s my thoughts.
First, CPAN may have been a good idea to start with, but my last few
experiences with it have been bad. I’ve managed to wind up with a number
of misconfigured modules and no way to remove them and reinstall them. In
theory, CPAN is a wonderful platform independent tool. In practice, it’s
bad enough that I don’t want to do much in Perl anymore (not to mention
that I’m a major fan of Ruby).
Second, I’ve played with Gentoo and while it has some great ideas, it
won’t install easily on some of my systems. It’s a great concept and I’m
looking forward to the time that both the distribution works better and my
slowest system is fast enough that installation is practical.
Third, I’m running a Debian system as my main server and 5 (sometimes
more) RedHat 7.3 systems for other uses. I’m using apt-get
(apt.freshrpms.com) to install and upgrade the RedHat boxes. If Ruby
modules were available as RPMs, it would make life much easier for me.
I’m a little overwhelmed in my life right now, so I won’t have time to
implement this for quite a while. Also, I don’t really know the RPM
format or the RAA very well, so it would also be a major learning
experience.
Just my thoughts on what would work best for me.
– Matt
But most OS’s don’t have Linux. What would you do about Mac OS X, FreeBSD
and Solaris?
We could try to design something that works similar to RPM, but it’d have
to be Ruby-specific.
···
On Wed, Feb 12, 2003 at 06:58:21AM +0900, Matt Lawrence wrote:
I’m a little overwhelmed in my life right now, so I won’t have time to
implement this for quite a while. Also, I don’t really know the RPM
format or the RAA very well, so it would also be a major learning
experience.
–
Daniel Carrera
Graduate Teaching Assistant. Math Dept.
University of Maryland. (301) 405-5137
Matt, you can try out ALT Linux [1] – 2.2 release will be
available soon and it has apt-get, proper (well, mostly)
dependencies in repository and growing choice of Ruby modules [2]:
trickster:~> apt-cache search ruby | egrep ‘(^(lib.*)?ruby)|(ruby$)’ | wc -l
37
In fact, Ruby seems to gain more “system” status within the
distro and its community hence the advice. Of course, it’s
competing to RH7.3 rather than to Debian as in above 
[1] http://altlinux.org
[2] ALT Linux Wiki
PS: hope it doesn’t sound like direct advertising
···
On Wed, Feb 12, 2003 at 06:58:21AM +0900, Matt Lawrence wrote:
Third, I’m running a Debian system as my main server and 5
(sometimes more) RedHat 7.3 systems for other uses. I’m using
apt-get (apt.freshrpms.com) to install and upgrade the RedHat
boxes. If Ruby modules were available as RPMs, it would make
life much easier for me.
–
---- WBR, Michael Shigorin mike@altlinux.ru
------ Linux.Kiev http://www.linux.kiev.ua/
To Matt Lawrence
Re: Ruby module distribution
dear developers
for some time now i have been hearing about this problem facing the future of ruby. i have been working on a pakaging system that is based on pear, xml and apt-get. i have been trying out all the packages. if u ppl have any comments mail me
i still have to orgnise my ideas and code i am getting delayed due to my exams… ( it will get over on the 6th March ) 
Requirements for Package.
1. Clean Code - Standard Indenting, etc...
2. Samples Code Included.
3. Docs Included.
a sample of the control file
package.xml
<?xml version="1.0"?>
Regards
Warren Brian Noronha
warren@freedomink.org
···
I’ve been reading the various messages on how to distribute Ruby modules.
Well, here’s my thoughts.
First, CPAN may have been a good idea to start with, but my last few
experiences with it have been bad. I’ve managed to wind up with a number
of misconfigured modules and no way to remove them and reinstall them. In
theory, CPAN is a wonderful platform independent tool. In practice, it’s
bad enough that I don’t want to do much in Perl anymore (not to mention
that I’m a major fan of Ruby).
Second, I’ve played with Gentoo and while it has some great ideas, it
won’t install easily on some of my systems. It’s a great concept and I’m
looking forward to the time that both the distribution works better and my
slowest system is fast enough that installation is practical.
Third, I’m running a Debian system as my main server and 5 (sometimes
more) RedHat 7.3 systems for other uses. I’m using apt-get
(apt.freshrpms.com) to install and upgrade the RedHat boxes. If Ruby
modules were available as RPMs, it would make life much easier for me.
I’m a little overwhelmed in my life right now, so I won’t have time to
implement this for quite a while. Also, I don’t really know the RPM
format or the RAA very well, so it would also be a major learning
experience.
Just my thoughts on what would work best for me.
– Matt
–
Knucklehead: “Knock, knock”
Pee Wee: “Who’s there?”
Knucklehead: “Little ol’ lady.”
Pee Wee: “Liddle ol’ lady who?”
Knucklehead: “I didn’t know you could yodel”
I’m a little overwhelmed in my life right now, so I won’t have time to
implement this for quite a while. Also, I don’t really know the RPM
format or the RAA very well, so it would also be a major learning
experience.
But most OS’s don’t have Linux. What would you do about Mac OS X, FreeBSD
and Solaris?
Personally, I wouldn’t do anything, I don’t use those systems.
We could try to design something that works similar to RPM, but it’d have
to be Ruby-specific.
I’d really rather not have Yet Another Package Manager. I’ve had too many
problems with CPAN. As I said, RPMs would work best for me. I suspect
the best idea is to build a tool that can generate multiple package
formats.
– Matt
···
On Wed, 12 Feb 2003, Daniel Carrera wrote:
On Wed, Feb 12, 2003 at 06:58:21AM +0900, Matt Lawrence wrote:
If we make the next APT in Ruby we’ll be essentially creating a
Linux-like distribution centered on Ruby instead of Linux.
Don’t know if we really want that.
One possibility would be creating any system of our own and then letting
vendors modify it for each OS so that it is the “official” installation
means on each platform. For instance by having some kind of
“installation specialization” framework that could be suited to each
platform.
I mean, RAA.succ, raainstall, rpkg, etc, are no good at the end of the
day if they don’t play well with the packaging system of my Debian (the
argument applies to Gentoo, RH, FreeBSD, Windows or any OS we want to
run Ruby on) Each dist./OS has its policies, and we should respect them.
···
On Wed, Feb 12, 2003 at 07:08:11AM +0900, Daniel Carrera wrote:
On Wed, Feb 12, 2003 at 06:58:21AM +0900, Matt Lawrence wrote:
I’m a little overwhelmed in my life right now, so I won’t have time to
implement this for quite a while. Also, I don’t really know the RPM
format or the RAA very well, so it would also be a major learning
experience.
But most OS’s don’t have Linux. What would you do about Mac OS X, FreeBSD
and Solaris?
We could try to design something that works similar to RPM, but it’d have
to be Ruby-specific.
–
_ _
__ __ | | ___ _ __ ___ __ _ _ __
'_ \ / | __/ __| '_ _ \ / ` | ’ \
) | (| | |__ \ | | | | | (| | | | |
.__/ _,|_|/| || ||_,|| |_|
Running Debian GNU/Linux Sid (unstable)
batsman dot geo at yahoo dot com
*** Rince is wagner@schizo.DAINet.de (We have Joey, we have Fun, we have Linux on a Sun)
– Seen on #Debian
[Debian sid]
batsman@tux-chan:~/video$ apt-cache search ruby | egrep ‘(^(lib.*)?ruby)|(ruby$)’ | wc -l
105
You’re right about the latter
···
On Thu, Feb 13, 2003 at 01:35:17AM +0900, Michael Shigorin wrote:
On Wed, Feb 12, 2003 at 06:58:21AM +0900, Matt Lawrence wrote:
Third, I’m running a Debian system as my main server and 5
(sometimes more) RedHat 7.3 systems for other uses. I’m using
apt-get (apt.freshrpms.com) to install and upgrade the RedHat
boxes. If Ruby modules were available as RPMs, it would make
life much easier for me.
Matt, you can try out ALT Linux [1] – 2.2 release will be
available soon and it has apt-get, proper (well, mostly)
dependencies in repository and growing choice of Ruby modules [2]:
trickster:~> apt-cache search ruby | egrep ‘(^(lib.*)?ruby)|(ruby$)’ | wc -l
37
In fact, Ruby seems to gain more “system” status within the
distro and its community hence the advice. Of course, it’s
competing to RH7.3 rather than to Debian as in above
–
_ _
__ __ | | ___ _ __ ___ __ _ _ __
'_ \ / | __/ __| '_ _ \ / ` | ’ \
) | (| | |__ \ | | | | | (| | | | |
.__/ _,|_|/| || ||_,|| |_|
Running Debian GNU/Linux Sid (unstable)
batsman dot geo at yahoo dot com
Sic transit discus mundi
– From the System Administrator’s Guide, by Lars Wirzenius
I personally like the RPM paradigm, too, which is why I’ve spent a
considerable amount of time building Ruby and Ruby module RPMs. You can
find my work at http://www.caliban.org/files/redhat
I recently did some work on RPM itself to add Ruby module dependency
checking in the same way that rpm 4.x already handles this for Perl
modules. Unfortunately, I discovered that the whole dependency mechanism
is being rewritten in rpm 4.2 and that the work I did would need to be
completely rewritten. I’ll get back to it at some point in the future.
Ian
···
On Wed 12 Feb 2003 at 08:03:06 +0900, Matt Lawrence wrote:
I’d really rather not have Yet Another Package Manager. I’ve had too many
problems with CPAN. As I said, RPMs would work best for me. I suspect
the best idea is to build a tool that can generate multiple package
formats.
–
Ian Macdonald | Suggest you just sit there and wait till
ian@caliban.org | life gets easier.
>
>
>
If we make the next APT in Ruby we’ll be essentially creating a
Linux-like distribution centered on Ruby instead of Linux.
…and spend too much effort on that.
One possibility would be creating any system of our own and
then letting vendors modify it for each OS so that it is the
“official” installation means on each platform.
Umm… proper “makefiles” which do grok path parameters correctly
and in sane manner would do best I believe.
Any kind of dependency system is overkill since:
- people concerned with deps tend to use proper system-level tools;
- and people careless of them basically don’t deserve that effort
I may sound a bit egoistic here (being of first kind and using
apt-rpm), but duplicating the effort is not the best idea when
avoidable. And so I agree to these thoughts from a packager’s
standpoint (having packaged several ruby modules as well).
For instance by having some kind of “installation
specialization” framework that could be suited to each
platform.
Hey, that’s basically “/usr/local or /as/been/told”
Each dist./OS has its policies, and we should respect them.
Yes, and not try to stand up in the way or redo from scratch.
Every mature system out there seems to have more or less mature
dependency management.
Just my E0.02…
···
On Wed, Feb 12, 2003 at 08:35:24AM +0900, Mauricio Fern?ndez wrote:
–
---- WBR, Michael Shigorin mike@altlinux.ru
------ Linux.Kiev http://www.linux.kiev.ua/