From: Rick DeNatale Date: 2007-06-14T02:33:09+09:00 Subject: Re: Getting Ruby On 6/13/07, Peter Cooper wrote: > On 6/13/07, Ben Crowell wrote: > > On a related topic, it turns out that if you try to compile ruby > > from source, it won't work unless you already have ruby installed. > > I tried it yesterday, on an ubuntu fiesty box that didn't have > > ruby installed, and the build stopped with an error, because in > > one place, a script tries to invoke ruby. > > That's not been the case for me installing on Ubuntu, where I only > ever use sources. That said, I'm talking about the general releases > (1.8.6, etc) and not development builds. > > Usually all that's required from a bare install is the usual "apt-get > build-essential" and then the ./configure, make, make install combo on > the Ruby source.. generally works a treat :) Same experience here. However it should be noted that although this should build ruby, some of the extensions in the standard library might fail if you don't have their pre-requisite development packages loaded, things like readline, tk, zlib etc. The trick here once you've got a partially built ruby on a debian system is to figure out what debian ruby packages the missing pieces are in, and then do an apt-get build_dep on those packages, then make again, maybe after ./configure When I was struggling with getting everything I needed for Ruby and Rails on Ubuntu, Andy Hunt suggested that I build from source, I took that advice and haven't looked back. -- Rick DeNatale My blog on Ruby http://talklikeaduck.denhaven2.com/