# My app is still in development... should I upgrade it to 2.1?

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/my-app-is-still-in-development-should-i-upgrade-it-to-2-1/139878>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [June 8, 2008, 4:53pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/my-app-is-still-in-development-should-i-upgrade-it-to-2-1/139878 "2008-06-08T16:53:55Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/8edcca/32.png) [@wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/wemagor)\
**Post date:** [June 8, 2008, 4:53pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/my-app-is-still-in-development-should-i-upgrade-it-to-2-1/139878/1 "2008-06-08T16:53:55Z")

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Well, this is probably a pretty straightforward question. I started  
developing an app a few weeks ago with Rails 2.0.2, since 2.1 was  
still in RC status. The app is still in development, and probably  
about a quarter of the way done (mostly just basic CRUD stuff, nothing  
major). Since Rails 2.1 has been “officially” released, I’m wondering  
if I should upgrade the app to use it now so I can take advantage of a  
lot of the things which 2.1 added.

I know that it’s usually a bad idea to upgrade blindly to the new  
version on a working app, but what about one that you’re still in the  
development stages of? A few of the Rails 2.1 features I think could  
really help some parts of the app, and worse comes to worse if it did  
break anything, there isn’t anything major going on with it at the  
moment.

Thoughts?

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**Author:** ![wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/8edcca/32.png) [@wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/wemagor)\
**Post date:** [June 8, 2008, 4:59pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/my-app-is-still-in-development-should-i-upgrade-it-to-2-1/139878/2 "2008-06-08T16:59:48Z")

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I was in the identical position. The files that 2.0.2 and 2.1 generate  
are not very different  
I generated a blank 2.1 project and used the MELD program, available  
in Ubuntu, to diff and merge.  
It only took 15 minutes to morph my project to 2.1  
I don’t think there are many new items that will break much of  
anything, mine ran fine.

As always, backup you app before your try this, but it worked great  
for me

Good luck

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**Author:** ![wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/8edcca/32.png) [@wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/wemagor)\
**Post date:** [June 9, 2008, 5:24pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/my-app-is-still-in-development-should-i-upgrade-it-to-2-1/139878/3 "2008-06-09T17:24:22Z")

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I keep waiting to see a post of anyone upgrading their Windows XP  
machine from 2.0.2 to 2.1 ?  
Does anyone know an easy way to do this? I’ve read ‘scare stories’ of  
the new GEMS loading in weird ways.  
Kathleen

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**Author:** ![wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/8edcca/32.png) [@wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/wemagor)\
**Post date:** [June 9, 2008, 6:05pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/my-app-is-still-in-development-should-i-upgrade-it-to-2-1/139878/4 "2008-06-09T18:05:07Z")

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When I’ve had weirdness, it was caused by having [gems.rubyonrails.org](http://gems.rubyonrails.org)  
in my sources list. That source includes beta gems.

Use ‘gem environment’ to check.

On Mon, Jun 9, 2008 at 11:23 AM, removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid

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**Author:** ![wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/8edcca/32.png) [@wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/wemagor)\
**Post date:** [June 9, 2008, 6:42pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/my-app-is-still-in-development-should-i-upgrade-it-to-2-1/139878/5 "2008-06-09T18:42:10Z")

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> Thoughts?

Probably less of an issue with “vanilla” Rails as opposed to  
compatibility with any gems that you use…

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**Author:** ![wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/8edcca/32.png) [@wemagor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/wemagor)\
**Post date:** [June 16, 2008, 3:24am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/my-app-is-still-in-development-should-i-upgrade-it-to-2-1/139878/6 "2008-06-16T03:24:15Z")

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Quoting Wayne M [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid):

> Well, this is probably a pretty straightforward question. I started  
> developing an app a few weeks ago with Rails 2.0.2, since 2.1 was  
> still in RC status. The app is still in development, and probably  
> about a quarter of the way done (mostly just basic CRUD stuff, nothing  
> major). Since Rails 2.1 has been “officially” released, I’m wondering  
> if I should upgrade the app to use it now so I can take advantage of a  
> lot of the things which 2.1 added.

I’d say yes. BUT, make sure that all the plugins you use are available  
for  
Rails 2.1. In my case, there are development versions of will\_paginate  
available for 2.1, but not released versions. So I uninstalled 2.1,  
though I  
could have forced my app to use 2.0. I will be going to 2.1 eventually,  
but  
not today.

Jeffrey