# Irb error on startup

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/irb-error-on-startup/146004>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [August 16, 2008, 12:36am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/irb-error-on-startup/146004 "2008-08-16T00:36:53Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 4\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![ppk007](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/bb73d2/32.png) [@ppk007](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ppk007)\
**Post date:** [August 16, 2008, 12:36am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/irb-error-on-startup/146004/1 "2008-08-16T00:36:53Z")

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Hi,

I am having a problem that I’ve not seen before and would appreciate  
some help in debugging.

When I try to start irb, I get the following error:  
vadai:~ ppk$ irb  
/Library/Ruby/Site/1.8/rubygems/custom\_require.rb:27:in  
`gem_original_require': no such file to load -- config/environment.rb (LoadError) from /Library/Ruby/Site/1.8/rubygems/custom_require.rb:27:in`require’  
from  
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:253:in  
`load_modules' from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:251:in`each’  
from  
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:251:in  
`load_modules' from /System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/1.8/irb/init.rb:21:in`setup’  
from  
/System/Library/Frameworks/Ruby.framework/Versions/1.8/usr/lib/ruby/1.8/irb.rb:54:in  
`start’  
from /usr/bin/irb:13

Any help would be appreciated. Thanks.

My environment:

System: Mac OS X 10.5.4  
Ruby: ruby 1.8.6 (2008-03-03 patchlevel 114) [universal-darwin9.0]  
gem: 1.2.0  
rails: Rails 2.1.0  
Gems:  
\*\*\* LOCAL GEMS \*\*\*

actionmailer (2.1.0, 1.3.6)  
actionpack (2.1.0, 1.13.6)  
actionwebservice (1.2.6)  
activerecord (2.1.0, 1.15.6)  
activeresource (2.1.0)  
activesupport (2.1.0, 1.4.4)  
acts\_as\_ferret (0.4.3, 0.4.1)  
capistrano (2.4.3, 2.0.0)  
cgi\_multipart\_eof\_fix (2.5.0, 2.2)  
daemons (1.0.10, 1.0.9, 1.0.7)  
dnssd (0.7.0, 0.6.0)  
fastthread (1.0.1, 1.0)  
fcgi (0.8.7)  
ferret (0.11.6, 0.11.4)  
gem\_plugin (0.2.3, 0.2.2)  
highline (1.4.0, 1.2.9)  
hpricot (0.6.161, 0.6)  
libxml-ruby (0.8.3, 0.3.8.4)  
mongrel (1.1.5, 1.1.4, 1.0.1)  
needle (1.3.0)  
net-scp (1.0.1)  
net-sftp (2.0.1, 1.1.0)  
net-ssh (2.0.3, 1.1.2)  
net-ssh-gateway (1.0.0)  
rails (2.1.0, 1.2.6)  
rake (0.8.1, 0.7.3)  
rb-appscript (0.5.1)  
RedCloth (4.0.1, 3.0.4)  
ruby-openid (2.1.2, 1.1.4)  
ruby-yadis (0.3.4)  
rubygems-update (1.2.0)  
rubynode (0.1.5, 0.1.3)  
rubyosa (0.4.0)  
sqlite3-ruby (1.2.2, 1.2.1)  
termios (0.9.4)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ppk007](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/bb73d2/32.png) [@ppk007](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ppk007)\
**Post date:** [August 26, 2008, 7:42pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/irb-error-on-startup/146004/2 "2008-08-26T19:42:08Z")

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I still haven’t solved the problem, but I noticed that when I type in  
the full path to irb at the shell prompt, /usr/bin/irb, I don’t have  
this problem. It just starts up fine. If I type “irb” then I get this  
problem.

Any suggestions?

Thanks.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ppk007](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/bb73d2/32.png) [@ppk007](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ppk007)\
**Post date:** [August 26, 2008, 8:40pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/irb-error-on-startup/146004/3 "2008-08-26T20:40:25Z")

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On Aug 26, 2008, at 10:37 , Pravin Kumar wrote:

> I still haven’t solved the problem, but I noticed that when I type in  
> the full path to irb at the shell prompt, /usr/bin/irb, I don’t have  
> this problem. It just starts up fine. If I type “irb” then I get this  
> problem.

% which irb

it’ll prolly answer /usr/local/bin/irb or somesuch… that means  
you’ve got multiple installs of ruby on your system and neither has a  
customized suffix (like ruby19 or ruby187). I recommend against that.  
Consider nuking your second install and reinstalling with --suffix  
passed to configure.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![ppk007](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/bb73d2/32.png) [@ppk007](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/ppk007)\
**Post date:** [August 27, 2008, 4:10pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/irb-error-on-startup/146004/4 "2008-08-27T16:10:51Z")

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Pravin Kumar wrote:

> I still haven’t solved the problem, but I noticed that when I type in  
> the full path to irb at the shell prompt, /usr/bin/irb, I don’t have  
> this problem. It just starts up fine. If I type “irb” then I get this  
> problem.
> 
> Any suggestions?
> 
> Thanks.

Make sure that irb is in your path, for starters…