# BSD: Use gems or ports?

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/bsd-use-gems-or-ports/91840>\
**Category:** Deployment\
**Created:** [April 12, 2007, 7:59pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/bsd-use-gems-or-ports/91840 "2007-04-12T19:59:39Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![zerohalo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/5fc32e/32.png) [@zerohalo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/zerohalo)\
**Post date:** [April 12, 2007, 7:59pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/bsd-use-gems-or-ports/91840/1 "2007-04-12T19:59:39Z")

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I’m deploying Rails on a new BSD 6.2 server. I’ve always used gems to  
install and update Rails and other Ruby libraries on other systems. My  
IT dept wants us to use ports across the board as much as possible. Yet  
most talk of Rails deployment on mailing lists, etc., is all about gems.  
Is gems “the” way to deploy/maintain Rails (and libraries needed by  
Rails apps), or does ports work just as well? Are there advantages using  
gems instead of ports? Or does either work? Not ever gem has a port, so  
do you install Rails from ports, and other libraries from gems - mix and  
match? Any advice? Thank you.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![zerohalo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/5fc32e/32.png) [@zerohalo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/zerohalo)\
**Post date:** [April 12, 2007, 8:18pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/bsd-use-gems-or-ports/91840/2 "2007-04-12T20:18:05Z")

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PS. I should have specified: This is FreeBSD. And Ruby is installed from  
ports.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![zerohalo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/z/5fc32e/32.png) [@zerohalo](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/zerohalo)\
**Post date:** [April 12, 2007, 8:44pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/bsd-use-gems-or-ports/91840/3 "2007-04-12T20:44:57Z")

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Ports do not work as well. Gems are updated far more often. However,  
if you don’t always want to be bleeding edge, and can live with an  
“old” version for some time, it’d be okay I guess. Afaik, rails is  
available as a port.

> **[FreshPorts -- www/rubygem-rails: MVC web application framework](https://www.freshports.org/www/rubygem-rails)**
>
> Rails is a web-application framework for the MVC pattern that includes
> both a template engine, controller framework, and object-relational
> mapping package. Everything needed to develop web-apps that can run on
> CGI, FastCGI, and mod\_ruby
> 
> Being a...

And having said that, a search for “rubygem” yields a lot of results,  
and many of them seem to be current:

> **[FreshPorts -- Search](https://www.freshports.org/search.php?query=rubygem&search=go&num=10&stype=name&method=match&deleted=excludedeleted&start=1&casesensitivity=caseinsensitive)**
>
> Search

Vish