# Keeping track of gems

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/keeping-track-of-gems/104266>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [May 16, 2007, 5:25am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/keeping-track-of-gems/104266 "2007-05-16T05:25:22Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/90db22/32.png) [@Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Tim_U)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2007, 5:25am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/keeping-track-of-gems/104266/1 "2007-05-16T05:25:22Z")

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Is there a tool to keep track of gems and the deploy them to servers?  
I have lots of gems installed but I only need a subset of them on the  
production machines. It’s a bit of a mess but here is the  
situation.

1. I develop on windows but deploy on linux so I can’t have the exact  
same gem on the two different architectures.
2. It seems like with every iteration I add more gems but I have no  
way to keep track of which gems are on which servers.
3. I don’t want all the gems on my development server to go to all the  
production servers for all the projects.

What I am looking for is a way to specify that project A needs gems  
1,2,3,4 and then somehow have capistrano make sure those gems are  
installed for the proper platform.

I can’t be the only person with this problem, I am hoping it’s already  
been solved.

Thanks.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/90db22/32.png) [@Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Tim_U)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2007, 5:33am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/keeping-track-of-gems/104266/2 "2007-05-16T05:33:23Z")

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On 5/15/07, Tim U. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote:

> Is there a tool to keep track of gems and the deploy them to servers?  
> I have lots of gems installed but I only need a subset of them on the  
> production machines. It’s a bit of a mess but here is the  
> situation.

I use a custom capistrano task to keep the gems up to date on my  
servers.

–  
Rick O.  
[http://lighthouseapp.com](http://lighthouseapp.com)  
[http://weblog.techno-weenie.net](http://weblog.techno-weenie.net)  
[http://mephistoblog.com](http://mephistoblog.com)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/90db22/32.png) [@Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Tim_U)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2007, 6:02am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/keeping-track-of-gems/104266/3 "2007-05-16T06:02:24Z")

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> I use a custom capistrano task to keep the gems up to date on my servers.

Would you mind sharing?

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/90db22/32.png) [@Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Tim_U)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2007, 9:34am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/keeping-track-of-gems/104266/4 "2007-05-16T09:34:44Z")

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> Would you mind sharing?

[http://pastie.caboo.se/61986](http://pastie.caboo.se/61986)

–  
Rick O.  
[http://lighthouseapp.com](http://lighthouseapp.com)  
[http://weblog.techno-weenie.net](http://weblog.techno-weenie.net)  
[http://mephistoblog.com](http://mephistoblog.com)

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/t/90db22/32.png) [@Tim\_U](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Tim_U)\
**Post date:** [May 16, 2007, 9:52am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/keeping-track-of-gems/104266/5 "2007-05-16T09:52:04Z")

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You might also check out puppet[1]… It’s very helpful if you have more  
than one machine to manage.

b

[1] [http://puppet.reductivelabs.com/](http://puppet.reductivelabs.com/)