Instiki failing to run - msvcrt-ruby18.dll not found

Hi

Hope you can help. I am completely inexperienced as regards
ruby/gems/instiki etc but I do have some general PC experience.

I installed Ruby192 and Instiki 0.19.1

I did so because the instructions on instiki.org promised it was a
doddle, but 2 days later I’m still at a dead end.

I’ve installed ruby to c:\ruby192 and unzipped the devkit to the same
directory. I’ve installed instiki-0.19.1 to the default.

I’ve run ruby dk.rb init and install, and ruby bundle and these looked
ok.

I’ve run the latest ruby gems pack 1.3.7 and gem install rubygems-update
appears to work ok, but update_rubygems fails.

still getting msvcrt-ruby18.dll not found when running ruby instiki.

Help! Please explain any instructions in idiot language as its taken 2
days to get this far.

Thanks

John

Luis L. wrote in post #968299:

On Dec 14, 10:04am, John S. [email protected] wrote:

I’ve installed ruby to c:\ruby192 and unzipped the devkit to the same
Help! Please explain any instructions in idiot language as its taken 2
days to get this far.

Instiki has just recently made compatible with Ruby 1.9, but they do
not mention Ruby 1.9.2 in their site, so I would assume is not.

You are not providing the full output of the console when you’re
running instiki, we need the full backtrace to be able to help you.

I’m assuming a gem that is installed is conflicting, so far the only
gem I can think of is json, which do not provide fat-binaries
compatible with Ruby 1.8 and 1.9.

To solve that particular gem issue, you will need to uninstall
existing gem (gem uninstall json) and install it using the
RubyInstaller DevKit:

Downloads
Development Kit · oneclick/rubyinstaller Wiki · GitHub

All that assuming you’re using RubyInstaller distribution of Ruby
1.9.2

Hi

Thanks for the response. There were technical reasons why I couldnt
provide more information earlier. What’s interesting to a newbie like
myself is the local gems seem to differ from the installed gems?

I uninstalled JSON as you suggested before running the below.

C:\instiki-0.19.1>ruby bundle update
Fetching source index for http://rubygems.org/
Using rake (0.8.7)
Using abstract (1.0.0)
Using erubis (2.6.6)
Using gem_plugin (0.2.3)
Using itextomml (1.4.5)
Using json (1.4.6)
Using mongrel (1.2.0.pre2)
Using nokogiri (1.4.4.1)
Using rubyzip (0.9.4)
Using sqlite3-ruby (1.3.2)
Using bundler (1.0.0)
Your bundle is updated! Use bundle show [gemname] to see where a
bundled gem i
s installed.

C:\instiki-0.19.1>gem list

*** LOCAL GEMS ***

minitest (1.6.0)
rake (0.8.7)
rdoc (2.5.8)
rubygems-update (1.3.7)
sqlite3-ruby (1.3.2 x86-mingw32)

C:\instiki-0.19.1>ruby instiki
=> Booting Mongrel
=> Rails 2.3.10 application starting on http://0.0.0.0:2500
** Erubis 2.6.6
=> Call with -d to detach
=> Ctrl-C to shutdown server

Regards

John

On Dec 14, 10:04am, John S. [email protected] wrote:

I’ve installed ruby to c:\ruby192 and unzipped the devkit to the same
Help! Please explain any instructions in idiot language as its taken 2
days to get this far.

Instiki has just recently made compatible with Ruby 1.9, but they do
not mention Ruby 1.9.2 in their site, so I would assume is not.

You are not providing the full output of the console when you’re
running instiki, we need the full backtrace to be able to help you.

I’m assuming a gem that is installed is conflicting, so far the only
gem I can think of is json, which do not provide fat-binaries
compatible with Ruby 1.8 and 1.9.

To solve that particular gem issue, you will need to uninstall
existing gem (gem uninstall json) and install it using the
RubyInstaller DevKit:

All that assuming you’re using RubyInstaller distribution of Ruby
1.9.2

Hi

still getting msvcrt-ruby18.dll not found unfortunately. Although the
server appears to run there is nothing at http://0.0.0.0:2500

would it be worth uninstalling ruby192 and going for an earlier version
instead?

regards

John

On Dec 15, 5:14am, John S. [email protected] wrote:

Hi

still getting msvcrt-ruby18.dll not found unfortunately. Although the
server appears to run there is nothing athttp://0.0.0.0:2500

would it be worth uninstalling ruby192 and going for an earlier version
instead?

As I mentioned before, the issue you’re getting about the missing
msvcrt-ruby18.dll is due a binary gem (json) not been compiled for
Ruby 1.9 (is expecting Ruby 1.8)

I provided you links and steps on how to resolve that issue, yet still
you haven’t followed those.

But, in case my english isn’t good enough:

  1. Download and install RubyInstaller DevKit:
  1. Uninstalll existing json gem

gem uninstall json --all

  1. Install and compile json gem:

gem install json --platform=ruby

  1. Start instiki.

That should solve the issue you’re having.

As I mentioned before, the issue you’re getting about the missing
msvcrt-ruby18.dll is due a binary gem (json) not been compiled for
Ruby 1.9 (is expecting Ruby 1.8)

sounds reasonable. although I only have a vague conception of what a
binary gem is, as opposed to any other type.

I provided you links and steps on how to resolve that issue, yet still
you haven’t followed those.

Yes, I did or tried to. I would point out that I asked for an idiot
guide and wasn’t being entirely frivolous - those links seemed to assume
some knowledge which I didn’t have. Possibly I should have used
‘completely inexperienced’ but I assumed you’d understand. Yeah, I know
assume makes an “ass out of you and me”.

But, in case my english isn’t good enough:

Your English is perfect, and I’m grateful for your support, but would
appreciate some respect for someone who doesn’t have your background.

  1. Download and install RubyInstaller DevKit:

Downloads
Home · oneclick/rubyinstaller Wiki · GitHub

Looking at the installation instructions these are still assuming some
background - how do I remove artifacts from previous installations - is
this as simple as deleting a gem folder somewhere or just as you say
lower down?

  1. Uninstalll existing json gem

gem uninstall json --all

  1. Install and compile json gem:

gem install json --platform=ruby

  1. Start instiki.

That should solve the issue you’re having.

Unfortunately not (see attachment). Possibly something I’ve missed with
the Devkit (see my comments above). I was installing the devkit into the
ruby192 folder as this seemed to be ‘seen’ better (some kind of path
issue) but perhaps this isn’t the thing to do.

A lot of the stuff I’ve read just says ‘download this’ and ‘install
this’ and ‘run this’ without actually being detailed about the correct
foldernames or telling you where you should be when running files
(C:ruby192, C:\instiki… etc or what to do if files are not being seen
by the installation. Hence my implied comments about needing the process
KISS.

Please let me know if there are any other ‘info’ commands I can run that
might localise the issue (apart from layer 8 which is a given).

Regards

John

On Wed, Dec 15, 2010 at 1:10 PM, John S. [email protected] wrote:

sounds reasonable. although I only have a vague conception of what a
binary gem is, as opposed to any other type.

A binary gem is a gem that contains binaries (which means compiled
code, like C).

It’s a major source of headaches for Windows users and unexperienced,
non-coding *NIX users, since troubleshooting the installation can be a
pain in the neck.

this as simple as deleting a gem folder somewhere or just as you say
lower down?

Question: Have you ever installed the DevKit? No? Then you don’t have
any artifacts lying around.

If you aren’t sure, run “gem list”, and pipe it it into a text file
(“gem list > mygems.txt”), and remove your Ruby installation, then
reinstall, and re-download your gems.

Unfortunately not (see attachment). Possibly something I’ve missed with
the Devkit (see my comments above). I was installing the devkit into the
ruby192 folder as this seemed to be ‘seen’ better (some kind of path
issue) but perhaps this isn’t the thing to do.

It isn’t. Extract the DevKit into any old non-Ruby directory, and run
the dk.rb script to setup the DevKit. That means that your Ruby
install isn’t contaminated, yet RubyGems will hand compilations tasks
to the tools the DevKit provides.

A lot of the stuff I’ve read just says ‘download this’ and ‘install
this’ and ‘run this’ without actually being detailed about the correct
foldernames or telling you where you should be when running files
(C:ruby192, C:\instiki… etc or what to do if files are not being seen
by the installation. Hence my implied comments about needing the process
KISS.

Welcome to the Developer’s Life, where the pay is lousy, tools are
nasty, but if we couldn’t take a joke, we never should’ve started. :wink:

As a rule of thumb: Install Ruby where ever you like, or just use the
defaults. Add it to your path environment variable (The RubyInstaller
can do that for you, and you did, as your ability to run Ruby from
anywhere shows; on Linux your distribution’s package manager will
handle this for you, and the Homebrew toolchain will do that on Mac, I
thin, if you have Homebrew installed).

It’s best to install gems via the “gem” command, since it resolves gem
dependencies for you. If you download an honest to God program, refer
to its documentation.

That’s about as KISS as it gets. But don’t worry, soon enough you’ll
be using vim or Emacs, or write your own editor. :wink:

Also: You can try to install instiki via “gem install instiki”,
currently at version 0.10.2, which is more current than what you have
downloaded. Running “instiki” from the commandline should give you an
instiki server, if all went well. :slight_smile:


Phillip G.

Though the folk I have met,
(Ah, how soon!) they forget
When I’ve moved on to some other place,
There may be one or two,
When I’ve played and passed through,
Who’ll remember my song or my face.

Sorry to show ignorance - what exactly is contained in a back trace?

regards

John

Thanks very much Phillip

I’ve carried out your suggestion, think I am very close - still that
missing file though.

I’ve attached my latest results

regards

John

Microsoft Windows XP [Version 5.1.2600]
© Copyright 1985-2001 Microsoft Corp.

c:>cd instiki-0.19.1

c:\instiki-0.19.1>instiki

c:\instiki-0.19.1>set
PATH=.\lib\native\win32;C:\Ruby192\bin;C:\WINDOWS\system32
;C:\WINDOWS;C:\WINDOWS\System32\Wbem

c:\instiki-0.19.1>ruby.exe script\server -e production
internal:lib/rubygems/custom_require:29:in require': no such file to load -- script/../config/boot (LoadError) from <internal:lib/rubygems/custom_require>:29:inrequire’
from script/server:2:in `’

c:\instiki-0.19.1>

On Dec 15, 9:10am, John S. [email protected] wrote:

Your English is perfect, and I’m grateful for your support, but would
appreciate some respect for someone who doesn’t have your background.

Apologies, but I assume you have certain knowledge of programming.

gem uninstall json --all
3) Install and compile json gem:
gem install json --platform=ruby
4) Start instiki.
That should solve the issue you’re having.

Unfortunately not (see attachment). Possibly something I’ve missed with
the Devkit (see my comments above). I was installing the devkit into the
ruby192 folder as this seemed to be ‘seen’ better (some kind of path
issue) but perhaps this isn’t the thing to do.

In the wiki instructions it says, unders Step 3:

“Left double-click the self-extracting executable downloaded from Step
2 and choose a directory (without spaces) to install the DevKit
artifacts into. For example, C:\DevKit. In the instructions that
follow, the directory that you selected is identified as
<DEVKIT_INSTALL_DIR>.”

That clearly indicates where to put (as suggestion) the DevKit

A lot of the stuff I’ve read just says ‘download this’ and ‘install
this’ and ‘run this’ without actually being detailed about the correct
foldernames or telling you where you should be when running files
(C:ruby192, C:\instiki… etc or what to do if files are not being seen
by the installation. Hence my implied comments about needing the process
KISS.

In the same wiki page:

“cd <DEVKIT_INSTALL_DIR> from Step 3 above.”

That assumes you know how to use the command prompt.

“ruby dk.rb init to generate the config.yml file to be used later in
this Step. Your installed Rubies will be listed there (only those
installed by a RubyInstaller package are detected at present).”

If you pay attention to the wiki, will notice the formatting
difference between “ruby dk.rb init” and the other text, THAT is a
command to be executed (I assume you got this from the Instiki page
too)

You can’t expect a full detail of instructions like “install in C:
\FooBar” because it might be the chances your system lacks C: drive
(and I have seen those cases)

Please let me know if there are any other ‘info’ commands I can run that
might localise the issue (apart from layer 8 which is a given).

Please provide me the following 9and cut in your reply all the above
but just this information)

  1. full output of “gem env” command

  2. full output of “bundle show” from inside your instiki folder:

  • CD C:\where\you\installed\instiki
  • bundle show
  1. Full output that you’re getting when executed instiki and get the
    popup (that is stored in the log folder or shown at the console)

===

Once you do that, please do:

  1. gem uninstall json --all

  2. gem install json --platform=ruby

Please note the command, needs to be exact, In your previous message
you tried “gem install json gem” which was not like the command I
showed to you (I used colon to indicate the instruction and a clean
new line to show you the exact command that needed to be entered)

While I understand your background is not the same, I assume certain
criteria from your side to follow these instructions. I have no
problem in provide more instructions, but I expect you follow them
exactly as I provided.

If none of this work, I can go through the installation process and
provide you the exact, line by line, installation instructions even
with screenshots but that will not solve your problem, as every
computer and configuration is different, other things my be
interfering in your setup.

On Wed, Dec 15, 2010 at 3:29 PM, John S. [email protected] wrote:

Thanks very much Phillip

You are quite welcome. :slight_smile:

I’ve carried out your suggestion, think I am very close - still that
missing file though.

Can you give us the backtrace of the failed require action, and/or the
log that instiki creates? Then we might be able to narrow down which
gem is throwing the error (it most certainly is a binary gem that has
problems, and one that was compiled against a very old version of Ruby
for Windows).


Phillip G.

Though the folk I have met,
(Ah, how soon!) they forget
When I’ve moved on to some other place,
There may be one or two,
When I’ve played and passed through,
Who’ll remember my song or my face.

Morning All

I have taken account of what Luis and Phillip said in their messages.

I think I included a backtrace in my previous ‘instiki’ attachment, and
also in this one, but let me know if you need more.

I’ve followed the steps included in Luis’ comments.

I had to use ‘ruby bundle show’ as ‘bundle show’ didn’t work.

Only error now is ‘…msvcrt-ruby18.dll not found…’ / Firefox can’t
establish a connection to the server at 0.0.0.0:2500

Only files I have installed are:

c:\Devkit
c:\Ruby192
c:\Instiki-0.19.1

I also installed the latest “gem install instiki” as Phillip suggested
and a Ruby bundle updater (1.3.7) which I found on the web in response
to a problem like mine.

  • In their default folders. This was after a complete system rebuild for
    XP professional, and all the patches to Service Pack 3.
    (yes I was that frustrated!)

Hope that all makes sense. I have not run dk.rb since reinstalling JSON
although I note it does take account of the Devkit path now, so I assume
this does not matter. It was run previously and enhanced the rubies.

Thanks for your help

John

On Wed, Dec 15, 2010 at 6:29 PM, John S. [email protected] wrote:

Sorry to show ignorance - what exactly is contained in a back trace?

The last steps of your program before it gave up, and refused to do
its work (more or less).

More technical, it’s the steps the program did that led to the error.

For example:

PS C:\Users\Anonymous> ruby -e “puts variable”
-e:1:in <main>': undefined local variable or method variable’ for
main:Object (NameError)

The line below the PS, etc. would be the backtrace. A failed require
action looks much more complicated, but it usually tells us the
condition your program was in when the error occurred.


Phillip G.

Though the folk I have met,
(Ah, how soon!) they forget
When I’ve moved on to some other place,
There may be one or two,
When I’ve played and passed through,
Who’ll remember my song or my face.

I’ve trialled this across the 'net and it does seem to work ok as a
wiki. Haven’t tried uploading files yet.

As a matter of interest, my broadband router had these routes and I
don’t know if that might have affected the 0.0.0.0 address (assuming
this wouldn’t be treated as a local interface like 127.0.0.1)

127.0.0.1 255.255.255.255 127.0.0.1 lo0
192.168.1.254 255.255.255.255 192.168.1.254 bridge0

  • snip -
    127.0.0.0 255.0.0.0 127.0.0.1 lo0
    0.0.0.0 0.0.0.0 -snip / static ip of router- ppp0

regards

John

*** UPDATE ***

On a strange urge, I decided to ignore the instructions and try

http://127.0.0.1:2500/ instead - this brings up the wiki configuration
page!!

I don’t know what made me do that… use the loopback address. Should
this still work on 127.x.x.x and without the missing ruby18 file?

Answers on a postcard.

Regards

John

----------------- http://127.0.0.1:2500

Instiki Setup

Cong…ions on succesfully installing and starting Instiki. Since
this is the first time Instiki has been run on this port, you’ll need to
do a brief one-time setup.

  1. Name and address for your first web
    The name of the web is included in the title on all pages. The
    address is the base path that all pages within the web live beneath. Ex:
    the address “rails” gives URLs like /rails/show/HomePage. The address
    can only consist of letters and digits.
    Name: Address:
  2. Password for creating and changing webs
    Administrative access allows you to make new webs and change
    existing ones.
    Everyone with this password will be able to do this, so pick it
    carefully!
    Password: Verify:

Ok, everything works but I still have the missing file error.

I’d like to fix this as it prevents instiki from starting automatically
from a batch file

Any suggestions please

Thanks

John