From: Robert Feldt <feldt@...>
Date: 2004-08-26T23:16:48+09:00
Subject: Re: Binary gems with precompiled so files for different platforms?

Richard Kilmer wrote:

>Robert,
>
>The way this works is the 'platform' attribute of the Gem::Specification
>object in your .gemspec.  Normally, for pure-Ruby libraries, this is set to
>Gem::Platform::RUBY.  We are gonna release a 0.8.0 version that adds the
>ability to specify:
>
>  spec.platform = Gem::Platform::CURRENT
>
>Which pulls the current platform (from RUBY_PLATFORM) and sets it as a
>binary gem.  So, on win32, if you do a:
>
>  gem build mygem.gemspec
>
>With the cygwin-based Ruby, it will set that as the platfrom (and the name
>will be something like mygem-0.1.0-cygwin.gem or soemthing), if you run it
>from the standard win32 version it will be named mygem-0.1.0-mswin32.gem.
>When you say:
>
>  gem install mygem
>
>It will present a list of available platforms (and identify your current
>platform) for you to choose from.  You could also publish one with the
>platform as RUBY and specify:
>
>  spec.extensions << 'ext/extconf.rb'
>
>...or wherever your extconf.rb is for the native extension itself and that
>will be presented as a source version.  If there was no binary version
>available for your platform, or you were so inclined to build it for
>yourself, you could select the source version of the gem from the list and
>it will build the extension upon gem install.
>
>This choosing between platforms will be all operational in 0.8.0 of
>rubygems...which should be out within a week.
>
>  
>
Thanks for the info; this sounds reasonable. Looking forward to it.

Thanks,

Robert