# Rails without Gems?

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/rails-without-gems/65024>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [August 15, 2006, 7:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/rails-without-gems/65024 "2006-08-15T19:12:17Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 6\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/eb9ed0/32.png) [@dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dlewan)\
**Post date:** [August 15, 2006, 7:12pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/rails-without-gems/65024/1 "2006-08-15T19:12:17Z")

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All,

Caveat: New user naivete to follow.

I’m starting an application in Rails and I can’t use Gems. (There are  
legal implications in deploying unknown code here.) But Rails seems to  
have an extraordinary dependence on Gems.

If I say ‘rails PROJECT’, then the PROJECT directory gets created with  
supporting scripts, etc., but since they work internally relative to  
their own location, they don’t find every thing they need (which would  
be offset by ‘…/’). So, almost everything that I do goes down the Gems  
require branches.

I find it hard to believe that the Rails creators intended to duplicate  
the entire Rails installation inside the application, but I always seem  
to hit this wall.

Are there standard ways to avoid this? Non-standard suggestions?

Thanks.

,Doug

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**Author:** ![dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/eb9ed0/32.png) [@dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dlewan)\
**Post date:** [August 15, 2006, 7:21pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/rails-without-gems/65024/2 "2006-08-15T19:21:09Z")

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Not entirely sure what you mean here … if you can’t use unknown  
code how can you get away with using Rails? (for a given value  
of unknown).

If its a download issue, gems can be installed from the local machine  
too.

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**Author:** ![dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/eb9ed0/32.png) [@dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dlewan)\
**Post date:** [August 15, 2006, 9:27pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/rails-without-gems/65024/3 "2006-08-15T21:27:38Z")

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to add a third option: if the concern is that you don’t want to rely  
on code outside your app’s distribution, you can “rake freeze\_gems”  
to import the current gems into your app space. you’d still be using  
gems, but they’d be gems under your control, not reliant on whatever  
someone has installed somewhere (n.b. if you need to update rails you  
have to undo and redo this to pick up the current version)

-faisal

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**Author:** ![dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/eb9ed0/32.png) [@dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dlewan)\
**Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 12:46am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/rails-without-gems/65024/4 "2006-08-16T00:46:53Z")

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Thanks for the good suggestions.

You’re right “unknown code” is definitely a variable. The point is that  
we’ll get through development and test and we need to be absolutely sure  
that what’s deployed is what’s tested. If the code doesn’t change, then  
we know something about the bugs that we’ve deployed; if it does, then  
we don’t. My client can live with known flaws, but unknown flaws puts  
him in a very bad position.

A large-scale upgrade is a different story. When we have to do that,  
we’re already at the start of a big upheaval.

Thanks again.

,Doug

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/eb9ed0/32.png) [@dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dlewan)\
**Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 11:43am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/rails-without-gems/65024/5 "2006-08-16T11:43:53Z")

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I see, the issue is that you wish to use the same versions of  
various libs in the field as you used in your test lab.

So basically getting the latest gems is not an option.

Have a good look (and experiment with) using gems to  
install extensions that are on the local file system. Basically  
not letting gems have a look on the web. That should give  
you a precise deployment - you bundle the versioned libs  
with your app, and _only_ gem install those.

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<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/d/eb9ed0/32.png) [@dlewan](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/dlewan)\
**Post date:** [August 16, 2006, 12:52pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/rails-without-gems/65024/6 "2006-08-16T12:52:59Z")

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i think you can even install gems of a user-specified version via a gem  
option, if that helps. otherwise, the freeze\_gems task could be useful.  
you  
execute  
it on your dev machine and have the rails gems extraved into  
vendor/rails,  
so when you just copy over your app dir, youll have exactly the same  
version  
of rails installed and used as in dev.

2006/8/16, Richard C. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid):

> with your app, and _only_ gem install those.
> 
> > ## him in a very bad position.

–  
Michael S. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)

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