Over the past few years, I’ve helped you walk through the process of
getting Ruby on Rails up and running on Mac OS X. The last version has
been getting a lot of comments related to issues with the new Apple
Leopard, so I’m going this post will expand on previous installation
guides with what’s working for me as of January 2008.
The following guide is how our development team at Planet
Argon prefers to setup our development
workstations
::: warning
[WARNING]{.caps}: This post contains some outdated instructions.
Please read Installing Ruby on Rails, Passenger, PostgreSQL, MySQL, Oh
My Zsh on Snow Leopard, Fourth
Edition
, which is focused on Installing Ruby on Rails on Snow Leopard.
:::
During this installation, we’ll have what we feel is the optimal
development stack for building Ruby on Rails
applications with our favorite database server,
PostgreSQL.
Ready? Let’s get started…
Phase One
During this initial phase, we’re going to install the underlying
dependencies that we’ll be building off of.
XCode 3.0
The first thing that you’ll need to install to get far with this process
is XCode tools, which is distributed by Apple. You can find this on the
DVD that your Leopard installer is on. You can also download the latest
version from Apple’s developer site.
The current version (3.0) is 1.1 GB.. so the download time will vary
depending on your connection speed. I would encourage you to drink some
tea and/or read a
book
Once you finish the installation, you can move forward. The rest of
these installation will not work until XCode is installed. :-)
MacPorts
In this next step, we’ll install MacPorts
(formerly known as DarwinPorts). The MacPorts web site describes itself
as, “an open-source community initiative to design an easy-to-use
system for compiling, installing, and upgrading either command-line, X11
or Aqua based open-source software on the Mac OS X operating system.”
This tool is about to become one of the most important tools on your
operating system as it’ll be used time and time again to maintain your
libraries and many of the Unix tools that you’ll be using. If you’re
from the Linux or BSD world, you are likely familiar with similar tools…
such as: apt-get, port, and yum.
First, you’ll want to download MacPorts and install the “dmg” disk file
for Leopard at the following link.
Once downloaded, you’ll want to run the installer and install it on your
workstation.
Work you way through the installer until successfully installed.
Once this finishes, you can open up your favorite terminal application
and run the following to test that it installed properly.
In my case, I’m now using Terminal.app.
Issue the command: /opt/local/bin/port version
If it responds with a version number like mine did in the screenshot
above, we’re moving along nicely.
Environment Paths
When we install MacPorts, the command to install/update ports installed
to /opt/local/bin. We had to provide the entire path as this isn’t
currently showing up in the default $PATH on Leopard. Let’s quickly
remedy this by modifying the file /etc/profile.
If you have Textmate installed, you can run the following from your
terminal: mate /etc/profile
Add the following line to the bottom of /etc/profile.
export PATH=/opt/local/bin:/opt/local/sbin:$PATH
You can use your favorite editor to update this file. Once you save it,
you’ll want to restart your terminal application (or open a new tab) to
create a new session. When your new terminal opens, run the following to
verify that port is showing up in your $PATH.
which port
You should see /opt/local/bin/port show up as the result of this
command.
Great, let’s continue to move forward.
Hiding Apple’s Ruby, Gems, and Rails
Before we install Ruby from MacPorts, we’ll go ahead and hide Apple’s
Ruby installations.
:~ robbyrussell$ sudo su -
Password:
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/ruby /usr/bin/ruby.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/gem /usr/bin/gem.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/rails /usr/bin/rails.orig
:~ root# logout
If you ever decide to remove MacPorts, you can just rename ruby.orig
back to ruby and you’re back where you started… and the same for the
others listed.
Phase Two
During this next phase, we’re going to install Ruby and Ruby on Rails.
Installing Ruby via MacPorts
Now that we have MacPorts up and running, we’re going to use it for the
first time. We’ll start by using it to install Ruby and the Rubygems
package.
$ sudo port install ruby rb-rubygems
Okay, this will take a little while. I’d suggest that you step out to
get some fresh air.
How was it outside? What’s the weather like there today? It’s currently
2:30am PST so it’s dark and an 28F outside so I didn’t stay outside very
long.
If you’re still waiting for it to install, perhaps you could watch the
following video. I might encourage you to check out more of
Jam, which was
recommended a few years ago to me by James Adam
at Canada on Rails.
Be warned… it’s a strange show, but I find strange things like this
funny. :-)
If you prefer something a bit more lighthearted…
Okay… when Ruby finishes installing, you’ll want to test that you can
run it.
Great, let’s move forward!
Installing Ruby on Rails via RubyGems
We’re now going to install the libraries that make up Ruby on Rails via
RubyGems.
$ sudo gem install --include-dependencies rails
This will install the following gems.
- rails-2.0.2
- rake-0.8.1
- activesupport-2.0.2
- activerecord-2.0.2
- actionpack-2.0.2
- actionmailer-2.0.2
- activeresource-2.0.2
Excellent, let’s move forward…
If you haven’t already purchased it, I recommend that you take a look at
The Rails Way (Addison-Wesley Professional Ruby
Series) by Obie Fernandez.
Installing Mongrel via RubyGems
Let’s now install Mongrel, which is an excellent Ruby-based web server
for Ruby on Rails applications. We use it in development and production
at Planet Argon and it’s also what we
recommend to our hosting
customers.
$ sudo gem install --include-dependencies mongrel mongrel_cluster
- Note: Be sure to select the proper platform for mongrel. (hint: OS
X is NOT mswin32)
My terminal output:
Select which gem to install for your platform (i686-darwin9.1.0)
1. mongrel 1.1.3 (java)
2. mongrel 1.1.3 (i386-mswin32)
3. mongrel 1.1.3 (ruby)
4. mongrel 1.1.2 (ruby)
5. mongrel 1.1.2 (mswin32)
6. mongrel 1.1.2 (java)
7. Skip this gem
8. Cancel installation
> 3
Select which gem to install for your platform (i686-darwin9.1.0)
1. fastthread 1.0.1 (mswin32)
2. fastthread 1.0.1 (ruby)
3. Skip this gem
4. Cancel installation
> 2
Building native extensions. This could take a while...
Building native extensions. This could take a while...
Successfully installed mongrel-1.1.3
Successfully installed gem_plugin-0.2.3
Successfully installed daemons-1.0.9
Successfully installed fastthread-1.0.1
Successfully installed cgi_multipart_eof_fix-2.5.0
Installing ri documentation for mongrel-1.1.3...
Installing ri documentation for gem_plugin-0.2.3...
Installing ri documentation for daemons-1.0.9...
Installing ri documentation for fastthread-1.0.1...
No definition for dummy_dump
No definition for dummy_dump
No definition for rb_queue_marshal_load
No definition for rb_queue_marshal_dump
Installing ri documentation for cgi_multipart_eof_fix-2.5.0...
Installing RDoc documentation for mongrel-1.1.3...
Installing RDoc documentation for gem_plugin-0.2.3...
Installing RDoc documentation for daemons-1.0.9...
Installing RDoc documentation for fastthread-1.0.1...
No definition for dummy_dump
No definition for dummy_dump
No definition for rb_queue_marshal_load
No definition for rb_queue_marshal_dump
Installing RDoc documentation for cgi_multipart_eof_fix-2.5.0...
Successfully installed mongrel_cluster-1.0.5
Great, you have almost all of the essentials.. except a database.
Phase Three
In this phase, we’re going to get our database server, PostgreSQL,
installed and the libraries that Ruby needs to communicate with it.
Installing PosgreSQL with MacPorts
At Planet Argon, we design and develop our
applications on top of PostgreSQL. I’ve been
advocating the adoption of this awesome open source database in the
Rails community for quite some time now.
The current version available of PostgreSQL via MacPorts is 8.3, which
is what we’ll now install with the port command.
$ sudo port install postgresql83 postgresql83-server
This will download and install the necessary libraries to run PostgreSQL
server and the client utilities.
Configuring PostgreSQL
When PostgreSQL is finished installing, it’ll tell you to run the
following commands to create a new database instance.
sudo mkdir -p /opt/local/var/db/postgresql83/defaultdb
sudo chown postgres:postgres /opt/local/var/db/postgresql83/defaultdb
sudo su postgres -c '/opt/local/lib/postgresql83/bin/initdb -D /opt/local/var/db/postgresql83/defaultdb'
Adding PostgreSQL to launchd
If you’d like to have PostgreSQL automatically startup after a system
restart, you can load it into launchd, which comes with OS X. By running
the following command, PostgreSQL will startup automatically on the next
system restart.
sudo launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.postgresql83-server.plist
Adding PostgreSQL to your $PATH
For some reason, the MacPort for PostgreSQL doesn’t get the programs in
your path automatically, so we’ll it now.
mate /etc/profile
Modify the PATH that we changed earlier to include
/opt/local/lib/postgresql83/bin@.
export PATH=/opt/local/bin:/opt/local/sbin:/opt/local/lib/postgresql83/bin:$PATH
Save the file and then open a new terminal. To test this, you should get
the following output when you run which psql.
:~ robbyrussell$ sudo su -
Password:
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/ruby /usr/bin/ruby.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/gem /usr/bin/gem.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/rails /usr/bin/rails.orig
:~ root# logout
```0
#### Creating a new PostgreSQL user
When I’m working on Rails applications in my development environment, I
really don’t want to have to specify a username and password in every
`config/database.yml` file for each of our ongoing client projects. When
PostgreSQL was installed, it created a superuser named **postgres**,
which is great, but I’d like one that matches my system username, so
that I’m not prompted at all for a username or password to connect to
PostgreSQL.
To do this, we’ll use the `createuser` command, which comes with
PostgreSQL. As you can see, I’m creating a new user with `superuser`
privileges (and will hopefully be the last time I have to do a
`-U postgres`).
:~ robbyrussell$ sudo su -
Password:
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/ruby /usr/bin/ruby.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/gem /usr/bin/gem.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/rails /usr/bin/rails.orig
:~ root# logout ```1
Let’s take a quick moment to test this out.
:~ robbyrussell$ sudo su -
Password:
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/ruby /usr/bin/ruby.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/gem /usr/bin/gem.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/rails /usr/bin/rails.orig
:~ root# logout
```2
Great, everything looks good here.
We now have a running installation of PostgreSQL with a new user
account. All we need to do now is install the appropriate RubyGem to
allow our Ruby applications to connect to it.
#### Installing PostgreSQL Libraries for Ruby
You can install postgres gem by running the following command.
:~ robbyrussell$ sudo su -
Password:
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/ruby /usr/bin/ruby.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/gem /usr/bin/gem.orig
:~ root# mv /usr/bin/rails /usr/bin/rails.orig
:~ root# logout ```3
Great. We’ve now built a professional development environment for
working with Ruby on Rails. Can you feel the excitement? :-)
Closing Thoughts
Like the previous versions, I hope that a few people find this useful. I
didn’t have to make a lot of changes from the second edition, but there
were enough to warrant a new post. I’ve been setting up my workstation
like this for about three years now and I’m looking forward to seeing
how a fresh install on Leopard works out for me.
If you have any problems, feel free to ask a question in the comments
below.
