From: Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality <ihatespam@...>
Date: 2006-08-18T15:30:10+09:00
Subject: Re: require and the site_ruby directory...


"Justin Collins" <collinsj@seattleu.edu> wrote in message 
news:44E55BF8.3040208@seattleu.edu...
> Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality wrote:
>> "Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality" <ihatespam@rogers.com> 
>> wrote in message news:NKaFg.144673$Em2.92508@fe10.news.easynews.com...
>>
>>> "Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality" <ihatespam@rogers.com> 
>>> wrote in message news:XpaFg.542444$C62.257947@fe12.news.easynews.com...
>>>
>>>> "Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality" <ihatespam@rogers.com> 
>>>> wrote in message news:xkaFg.542364$C62.447443@fe12.news.easynews.com...
>>>>
>>>>> "Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality" <ihatespam@rogers.com> 
>>>>> wrote in message 
>>>>> news:k2aFg.542068$C62.362943@fe12.news.easynews.com...
>>>>>
>>>>>> "Just Another Victim of the Ambient Morality" <ihatespam@rogers.com> 
>>>>>> wrote in message 
>>>>>> news:9D9Fg.541757$C62.90805@fe12.news.easynews.com...
>>>>>>
> <snip a bunch>
>>     Okay, after _way_ too many code modifications, I got it to almost 
>> work...
>>     One way that it is defective is that it can't always parse the links 
>> of a page.  The strange thing is that it works find for some pages (like 
>> slashdot.org) but completely fails for others (like rubyforge.org).  When 
>> it fails, it does so by failing to collect the URL of the link and the 
>> script dies by sending a message to a nil object.  I looked at the source 
>> and the two pages seem to be the same to me.  Can anyone guess what's 
>> going on?
>>     Also, why didn't "mechanize" "just work?"
>>     Thank you..
>
> It sounds like you didn't install this in any normal fashion? I have yet 
> to run into public Ruby libraries which require you to copy them into the 
> Ruby directory. Plus, I know Mechanize is available as a gem.
> Why are you copying it manually? I would suspect this as the root of the 
> issue, although it's hard to tell.

    I appreciate that it's hard to tell.
    I don't really know what gems are and I generally try to avoid things I 
don't understand.
    If you go to the sourceforge download site:

http://rubyforge.org/frs/?group_id=1453&release_id=6508

    You'll see that it comes in a .zip file with all the files in it.  Now, 
pehaps this opinion is naive of me but if the package doesn't simply work as 
it is packaged, then it is horribly broken.  I mean, really, what does the 
gem do that's so different and what necessitates this difference?