# ANN: guirb 0.01, a multi-toolkit Irb wrapper collection

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ann-guirb-0-01-a-multi-toolkit-irb-wrapper-collection/188629>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [May 15, 2010, 12:03am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ann-guirb-0-01-a-multi-toolkit-irb-wrapper-collection/188629 "2010-05-15T00:03:35Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 1\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Martin\_DeMello](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/m/f17d59/32.png) [@Martin\_DeMello](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Martin_DeMello)\
**Post date:** [May 15, 2010, 12:03am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/ann-guirb-0-01-a-multi-toolkit-irb-wrapper-collection/188629/1 "2010-05-15T00:03:35Z")

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Questions I’ll save you the trouble of Asking Frequently:

- What?

guirb is a collection of graphical frontends for irb, spun off from my  
old fxirb project. It’s been reworked to have a gui-independent layer,  
which TextWidget subclasses from various gui toolkits can sit on top  
of.

- Where?

> **[GitHub - martindemello/guirb: Graphical IRB wrappers](https://github.com/martindemello/guirb)**
>
> Graphical IRB wrappers. Contribute to martindemello/guirb development by creating an account on GitHub.

- How far along is it?

Right now there’s a minimal Tk text widget, adding little more than  
autoindentation and multiline history merging to irb

- Does it work?

More or less (see BUGS). Most critically, `puts` is broken, still  
trying to figure out why.

- Why bother?

It’s fun 🙂 Also, fxirb had a handful of appreciative users; I’m  
hoping a more polished and featureful irb shell will prove useful to  
people. I’d eventually like to see this become a drop-in repl  
component for people writing IDEs and such, with all the major  
toolkits supported. Also, it’s the first step in my long-term plan to  
write a ruby clone of the DrScheme IDE (if anyone else is interested  
in working on this I’d love to hear from you!)

- Why Tk?

It’s the only toolkit that Just Worked with MRI 1.9.1. Also, the  
TkText widget is pretty sweet. It should also, ideally, Just Work on  
all platforms TkRuby works on, though I’ll only be developing it for  
linux unless I get collaborators on the other platforms. Please do  
contribute versions for your favourite toolkit, though!

- Why 1.9?

It’s the wave of the future! I won’t gratuitously break 1.8  
compatibility, but it’s not really a goal for me.

- Why MRI?

It’s still the ‘default’ ruby. I would love to be compatible with as  
many implementations as I can, though, and will happily accept patches  
to that end.

- Can I help?

Thought you’d never ask! If anyone has an idea about the two Tk issues  
in the BUGS file, please do send in patches or suggestions. If you can  
port the Tk frontend to other toolkits and get it working on ruby 1.9  
that would be excellent, whether or not you have the time to maintain  
it thereafter. And of course feature requests and bug reports are  
always welcome.

martin