# Problem installing system\_timer in windows **URL:** \ **Category:** Rails\ **Created:** [July 10, 2009, 10:36am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/problem-installing-system-timer-in-windows/171860 "2009-07-10T10:36:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 3\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![shakor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/bcef8e/32.png) [@shakor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/shakor)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2009, 10:36am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/problem-installing-system-timer-in-windows/171860/1 "2009-07-10T10:36:05Z")
Hi, I recently started working on an existing Ruby On Rails application which production environment is linux. However we are trying to create a dev. platform with Eclipse in Windows and everything was working fine until one of our classes was trying to import system\_timer. The initial error I got is: no such file to load – system\_timer Application Trace: c:/Ruby/lib/ruby/site\_ruby/1.8/rubygems/custom\_require.rb:31:in `gem_original_require' c:/Ruby/lib/ruby/site_ruby/1.8/rubygems/custom_require.rb:31:in`require’ c:/Ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/activesupport-2.3.2/lib/active\_support/dependencies.rb:156:in `require' c:/Ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/activesupport-2.3.2/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:521:in`new\_constants\_in’ c:/Ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/activesupport-2.3.2/lib/active\_support/dependencies.rb:156:in `require' C:/Documents and Settings/eshakor/workspace/InfoQuality/app/models/ldap_user.rb:2 C:/Documents and Settings/eshakor/workspace/InfoQuality/app/controllers/auth_controller.rb:44:in`authenticateAndAuthorize’ C:/Documents and Settings/eshakor/workspace/InfoQuality/app/controllers/auth\_controller.rb:18:in `login’ Ok so I figured I need to install system\_timer so I opened a command prompt and typed: gem install system\_timer And got error: ‘nmake’ is not recognized as an internal or external command operable program or batch file. Hm, seems like I need some program called nmake. After some Googling it seemed like nmake was some kind of build utility. So I downloaded it and ran the install command again and got: ‘cl’ is not recognized as an internal or external command, operable program or batch file. Right, so I need a C compiler. After ALOT of searching and trial and error with various windows C compilers I finally I managed to find and install Microsoft Visual C++ Express Edition and opened an SVC prompt (a command prompt with some env. settings) and tried the command for the third time. This time I got a long stack trace which I will only show a small excerpt here: ``` cl -nologo -I. -Ic:/Ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/i386-mswin32 ``` -Ic:/Ruby/lib/ruby/1. 8/i386-mswin32 -I. -MD -Zi -O2b2xg- -G6 -c -Tcsystem\_timer\_native.c cl : Command line warning D9035 : option ‘Og-’ has been deprecated and will be r emoved in a future release cl : Command line warning D9002 : ignoring unknown option ‘-G6’ system\_timer\_native.c system\_timer\_native.c(10) : error C2061: syntax error : identifier ‘original\_mas k’ system\_timer\_native.c(10) : error C2059: syntax error : ‘;’ system\_timer\_native.c(11) : error C2061: syntax error : identifier ‘sigalarm\_mas k’ . . . So it seems Visual Studios compiler is not compatible with whatever compiler is needed to build system\_timer and this is where I am stuck. Where do I find a suitable C compiler for windows to build system\_timer? Or is there some other way to install system\_timer in windows? Im using Ruby 1.8x and Rails 2.2x. Really appreciate some help as I have spent over 10 hours trying to fix this seemingly easy issue and as I am really a Java developer I am not used to these kind of problems 😕 ---
**Author:** ![shakor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/bcef8e/32.png) [@shakor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/shakor)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2009, 10:43am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/problem-installing-system-timer-in-windows/171860/2 "2009-07-10T10:43:07Z")
On Jul 10, 9:36 am, Shahin K. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote: > . > > So it seems Visual Studios compiler is not compatible with whatever > compiler is needed to build system\_timer and this is where I am stuck. > Where do I find a suitable C compiler for windows to build system\_timer? > Or is there some other way to install system\_timer in windows? > > Im using Ruby 1.8x and Rails 2.2x. Really appreciate some help as I have > spent over 10 hours trying to fix this seemingly easy issue and as I am > really a Java developer I am not used to these kind of problems 😕 Well the compiler you found might not be exactly the right one, with all that stuff on windows about using the same compiler that was used to build ruby itself and so on, but even assuming you got all that sorted, the system\_timer homepage ([systemtimer.rubyforge.org](http://systemtimer.rubyforge.org)) says: “SystemTimer only works on UNIX platforms (Mac OS X, Linux, Solaris, BSD, …). You can install the gem on Microsoft Windows, but you will only get a convenience shell wrapping a simple call to timeout.rb under the cover.” Fred ---
**Author:** ![shakor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/s/bcef8e/32.png) [@shakor](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/shakor)\ **Post date:** [July 10, 2009, 1:04pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/problem-installing-system-timer-in-windows/171860/3 "2009-07-10T13:04:34Z")
Frederick C. wrote: > On Jul 10, 9:36�am, Shahin K. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) > wrote: > > > . > > > > So it seems Visual Studios compiler is not compatible with whatever > > compiler is needed to build system\_timer and this is where I am stuck. > > Where do I find a suitable C compiler for windows to build system\_timer? > > Or is there some other way to install system\_timer in windows? > > > > Im using Ruby 1.8x and Rails 2.2x. Really appreciate some help as I have > > spent over 10 hours trying to fix this seemingly easy issue and as I am > > really a Java developer I am not used to these kind of problems 😕 > > Well the compiler you found might not be exactly the right one, with > all that stuff on windows about using the same compiler that was used > to build ruby itself and so on, but even assuming you got all that > sorted, the system\_timer homepage ([systemtimer.rubyforge.org](http://systemtimer.rubyforge.org)) says: > > “SystemTimer only works on UNIX platforms (Mac OS X, Linux, Solaris, > BSD, �). You can install the gem on Microsoft Windows, but you will > only get a convenience shell wrapping a simple call to timeout.rb > under the cover.” > > Fred Yeah I know about that quote and since it is only a dev environment it is fine, as long as it just works. But that is the problem I have right now, I cant even get it to work since it seems impossible to install system\_timer in windows 😕