From: James Edward Gray II <james@...>
Date: 2007-01-10T22:07:01+09:00
Subject: Re: [ANN] Tattle - The Ruby Census

On Jan 10, 2007, at 12:52 AM, Ryan Davis wrote:

> Any gem should FULLY list all of its dependencies it requires to  
> work (defined broadly by rubygems but could be summarized as  
> "something mentioned by 'require'"). That would include rake if you  
> have a Rakefile.

I don't agree with that.

FasterCSV, for example, has a Rakefile.  It makes my life as a  
developer easier.  I can run tests easier, create releases easier,  
etc.  It has absolutely nothing to do with running FasterCSV.  Rake  
is not needed for that, so I think adding it as a dependency is wrong.

If you want to play with FasterCSV's source, you have two options.   
First, you can make sure rake is installed and use all the easy  
shortcuts I do.  Or, you can do things the slightly longer way.  I  
even document this.  Here's an excerpt from the FasterCSV documentation:

== Running the Tests

If you would like to run FasterCSV's test suite on your system before  
installing and you have Rake installed, just issue the following  
command from the root of the project directory:

   $ rake

If you do not have rake, use the following command instead:

   $ ruby -I lib:test test/ts_all.rb

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Remember, rake and hoe just automate some commands that can always be  
issued manually.

Thinking about it another way, how many precompiled extensions, for  
Windows let's say, include a Makefile?  What the heck do you need  
that for and how likely is make to be installed?

James Edward Gray II