# Re: Code organisation "template" interference(?) with RUBYLI

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/re-code-organisation-template-interference-with-rubyli/88359>\
**Category:** Ruby\
**Created:** [March 10, 2007, 12:54am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/re-code-organisation-template-interference-with-rubyli/88359 "2007-03-10T00:54:33Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 2\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![Joseph\_Schiller](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Joseph\_Schiller](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Joseph_Schiller)\
**Post date:** [March 10, 2007, 12:54am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/re-code-organisation-template-interference-with-rubyli/88359/1 "2007-03-10T00:54:33Z")

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Hi,

If you don’t need ADMIN rights to shuffle files from place to place, you  
might want to point your browser to [http://www.obsession.se/gentoo](http://www.obsession.se/gentoo) and  
give gentoo file manager a try. It is fast and has all the features  
conveniently in one place. It appears that you are trying to manage a  
graphical IDE style hierarchy that may not easily accomodate a complex  
file structure. I don’t know if there is a single solution, one approach  
from Debian is managing different versions of software using  
/etc/alternatives. You can write a simple bash script to integrate  
files. I would not recommend setting env vars for every project, env  
should rather accomodate lib or system files. I would much rather have  
one system-wide config across different projects.

Regards,

Joe

----- Original Message ----  
From: Paul van Delst [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)  
To: ruby-talk ML [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid)  
Sent: Friday, March 9, 2007 6:25:09 PM  
Subject: Code organisation “template” interference(?) with RUBYLIB envar

(Warning: this post is waaaaay longer than I intended)

Hello,

Apologies if the subject line is a bit cryptic, but it’s not easy to  
describe in a single  
line. Anyway…

A while back an astute fellow on comp.lang.ruby (thanks RobertK!)  
provided me with some  
advice on how to lay out ruby classes and code that ended up being so  
useful that I’ve  
applied the same organisational template for several projects. I may  
have butchered the  
advice, but basically I have the following sort of setup (apologies for  
the lengthy ASCII  
art too),

—project1 (module Proj1)  
| |–lib  
| | |—project1.rb (class Proj1::Runner)  
| | |—config  
| | | |  
| | | `--config.rb (class Proj1::Config) | | |---base | | | | | | | `–base.rb (class Proj1::Base)  
| | |—runner1 (module Proj1::Runner1)  
| | | |  
| | | |–base.rb (class Proj1::Runner1::Base \< Proj1::Base)  
| | | |–runner1.rb (class Proj1::Runner1::Runner \<  
Proj1::Runner1::Base)  
| | | |–class1.rb (class Proj1::Runner1::Class1 \<  
Proj1::Runner1::Base)  
| | | |–class2.rb (class Proj1::Runner1::Class2 \<  
Proj1::Runner1::Base)  
| | | …etc  
| | `---runner2 (== module Runner2) | | | | | |--base.rb (class Proj1::Runner2::Base < Proj::Base) | | |--runner2.rb (class Proj1::Runner2::Runner < Proj1::Runner2::Base) | | |--class1.rb (class Proj1::Runner2::Class1 < Proj1::Runner2::Base) | | |--class2.rb (class Proj1::Runner2::Class2 < Proj1::Runner2::Base) | | ...etc | |--test | | | | ...etc | |-project2 (module Proj2) | |--lib | | |---project2.rb (class Proj2::Runner) | | |---config | | | | | | | `–config.rb (class Proj2::Config)  
| | |—base  
| | | |  
| | | `--base.rb (class Proj2::Base) | | |---runner1 (module Proj2::Runner1) | | | | | | | |--base.rb (class Proj2::Runner1::Base < Proj2::Base) | | | |--runner1.rb (class Proj2::Runner1::Runner < Proj2::Runner1::Base) | | | |--class1.rb (class Proj2::Runner1::Class1 < Proj2::Runner1::Base) | | | |--class2.rb (class Proj2::Runner1::Class2 < Proj2::Runner1::Base) | | | ...etc | | `—runner2 (== module Runner2)  
| | |  
| | |–base.rb (class Proj2::Runner2::Base \< Proj2::Base)  
| | |–runner2.rb (class Proj2::Runner2::Runner \<  
Proj2::Runner2::Base)  
| | |–class1.rb (class Proj2::Runner2::Class1 \<  
Proj2::Runner2::Base)  
| | |–class2.rb (class Proj2::Runner2::Class2 \<  
Proj2::Runner2::Base)  
| | …etc  
| |–test  
| | |  
…etc

etc.

For any project, call it module ProjectX:

- the lib/projectX.rb file (class Project2::Runner) is the interface to  
a  
user. It’s the “main” runner class if you like.

- the ProjectX::Config class holds, surprise, all the configuration info  
(usually read in from a text file)

- the ProjectX::Base clase holds all the constants and methods that are  
shared throughout any particular ProjectX module

- the ProjectX::RunnerY::Base class holds all the constants and methods  
that are shared throughout any particular ProjectX::RunnerY module

- the ProjectX::RunnerY::Runner class is the controller that iterates  
over  
all the current module classes (the Class1, Class2,…ClassZ etc) and  
invokes their methods

- the ProjectX::RunnerY::ClassZ class actually does something. :o)

I like the above setup because it scales quite well. For some projects  
each “runnerY”  
contains another layer. It’s made it really easy to isolate  
functionality and test it.

Anyway, the problem I’m having now is I decided to consolidate all my  
code on a single  
machine and tack on the various locations of everything onto the RUBYLIB  
envar, i.e.

export RUBYLIB=$HOME/ruby/project1/lib:$HOME/ruby/project2/lib: etc…

So now when I do something like the following in  
project2/lib/runner1/base.rb,

require ‘base/base’  
module Proj2  
module Runner1  
class Base \< Proj2::Base  
# This is how the config gets passed along in  
# Runner1 module and holds shared Runner1 code  
end  
end  
end

and in project2/lib/runner1/runner.rb,

require ‘runner1/base’  
module Proj2  
module Runner1  
class Runner \< Proj2::Runner1::Base  
RUNNERS=[Class1,Class2,…,ClassZ]  
def run  
RUNNERS.each do |run\_class|  
r = run\_class.new  
r.config = self.config  
r.run  
end  
end  
end  
end  
end

and invoke the main script, ruby searches the RUBYLIB paths and finds  
the “base/base.rb”  
for project_1_ first (since it’s listed first) and loads that file  
instead of the  
“base/base.rb” for project_2_. Thus, I get errors like:

project2/lib/runner1/base.rb:4: uninitialized constant Project2::Base  
(NameError)

If I swap the listing in my RUBYLIB envar so that the project2 directory  
is listed first,  
everything is honky dory and runs fine.

Phewph! If you’ve made it this far, the beer is on me if we ever meet.

My questions are:

1. can I keep my current directory structure (which, believe it or not,  
seems quite  
logical to me) and avoid these file loading order problems?

2. IF not, how to fix this? I like the idea of generic file names and  
classes (config,  
base) across projects so that those that follow can grok multiple  
projects after studying  
the docs for just one.

Thanks for any insight.

cheers,

paulv

–  
Paul van Delst Ride lots.  
CIMSS @ NOAA/NCEP/EMC Eddy Merckx

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Joseph\_Schiller](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Joseph\_Schiller](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/Joseph_Schiller)\
**Post date:** [March 12, 2007, 3:35pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/re-code-organisation-template-interference-with-rubyli/88359/2 "2007-03-12T15:35:48Z")

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Joseph Schiller wrote:

> rather have one system-wide config across different projects.  
> Hi Joe,

Thanks for the input, but the projects run on a bunch of different  
platforms – various  
flavours of linux and various flavours of IBM AIX. The red tape involved  
for me to install  
something like the gentoo file manager on all of these systems (assuming  
that’s possible)  
is…well… I can’t even think of a suitable adjective! :o)

Thanks for the info.

cheers,

paulv