From: Eric Hodel <drbrain@...7.net>
Date: 2007-11-01T07:25:35+09:00
Subject: Re: clarification of ruby libraries installation paths?

On Oct 31, 2007, at 03:15 , Jonas Pfenniger wrote:
> I think it would help, and not only for debian, if the rubygems team
> could split the local package index with the rest of the project. The
> running code only needs to know what packages are available or not and
> be able to populate the $LOAD_PATH. For this, it is only useful to
> locate one (or more) package description indexes.

RubyGems already has a feature to deal with this, the GEM_PATH  
environment variable.  You can split up installed gems across any  
number of directories as you wish.

> By checking the write ability of a gemspec, the gem command-line can
> then decide if the package is locked (=> maintained by the system
> package manager) or not. It could also fallback on a user repository
> if the whole index is locked.

RubyGems doesn't know anything about packages (ruby libraries  
installed by something other than RubyGems).  If a package wraps `gem  
install` then RubyGems can't tell the difference between something  
installed by `gem install` and something installed by the package  
system.  Both will have a read-only .gemspec file.

By default RubyGems installs gems into GEM_HOME.  If you don't want  
users touching packaged gems, add a directory other than GEM_HOME to  
the GEM_PATH, and if users mess with it, blame them for shooting of  
their own feet.

--
Poor workers blame their tools. Good workers build better tools. The
best workers get their tools to do the work for them. -- Syndicate Wars