From: Eric Hodel <drbrain@...7.net>
Date: 2005-09-21T08:17:58+09:00
Subject: Re: RubyGems in Ruby HEAD

On 20 Sep 2005, at 10:02, Mauricio Fern�ndez wrote:

> Right now, RubyGems represents a step backwards relative to Minero
> Aoki's setup.rb in many regards as far as repackagers are concerned.
> To state it simply, it is often more difficult to package something
> released in .gem format than in an equivalent tarball + setup.rb. I  
> know
> this from my personal experience when repackaging a large number of
> libraries and applications [2] and most importantly from what several
> developers working on established repackaging efforts (Debian,  
> FreeBSD,
> PLD, Suse) have told me.

The FreeBSD ports tree supports gems without apparent problem.   
(Currently 11 gems are "repackaged" as FreeBSD ports, so the sample  
is small, but after looking at the implementation I don't forsee any  
dark times ahead.)

Even though I administer 10 FreeBSD boxes professionally, I probably  
won't use gems from the ports tree because the ports just don't  
update often enough for the gems I'm interested in.  The gem command  
itself also upgrades gems and cleans up old gems I don't need, so it  
is a more than adequate substitute for the ports tree.

-- 
Eric Hodel - drbrain@segment7.net - http://segment7.net
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