# Windows and Linux differences

**URL:** <https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/windows-and-linux-differences/132128>\
**Category:** Rails\
**Created:** [March 17, 2008, 8:21am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/windows-and-linux-differences/132128 "2008-03-17T08:21:51Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 5\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d9b06d/32.png) [@boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/boothy)\
**Post date:** [March 17, 2008, 8:21am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/windows-and-linux-differences/132128/1 "2008-03-17T08:21:51Z")

</div>

How hard or what would be the differences in learning and developing  
Ruby on a Windows computer then hosting on Linux, since  
Linux is the most common and economical way to host

ie would there be a lot of code conversion to upload the code

thanks

```
  ____________________________________________________________________________________

```

Never miss a thing. Make Yahoo your home page.  
[http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs](http://www.yahoo.com/r/hs)

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d9b06d/32.png) [@boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/boothy)\
**Post date:** [March 17, 2008, 9:38am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/windows-and-linux-differences/132128/2 "2008-03-17T09:38:18Z")

</div>

On Mar 17, 7:20 am, Roger B. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote:

> How hard or what would be the differences in learning and developing  
> Ruby on a Windows computer then hosting on Linux, since  
> Linux is the most common and economical way to host
> 
> ie would there be a lot of code conversion to upload the code

In theory just about everything would work, as long as you’re not  
doing things like calling system. Windows can sometimes be a bit more  
forgiving since it’s case insensitive, whereas typically most linux  
filesystems aren’t

Fred

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d9b06d/32.png) [@boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/boothy)\
**Post date:** [March 17, 2008, 10:31am UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/windows-and-linux-differences/132128/3 "2008-03-17T10:31:10Z")

</div>

Frederick C. wrote:

> On Mar 17, 7:20�am, Roger B. [removed\_email\_address@domain.invalid](mailto:removed_email_address@domain.invalid) wrote:
> 
> > How hard or what would be the differences in learning and developing  
> > Ruby on a Windows computer then hosting on Linux, since  
> > Linux is the most common and economical way to host
> > 
> > ie would there be a lot of code conversion to upload the code
> 
> In theory just about everything would work, as long as you’re not  
> doing things like calling system. Windows can sometimes be a bit more  
> forgiving since it’s case insensitive, whereas typically most linux  
> filesystems aren’t
> 
> Fred

((just backing up Fred here))

system calls filesystems, etc … (if you call  
“c:\path\to\windows\file”) that’s probably not gonna work on \*nix

😉

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d9b06d/32.png) [@boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/boothy)\
**Post date:** [March 17, 2008, 5:18pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/windows-and-linux-differences/132128/4 "2008-03-17T17:18:14Z")

</div>

for the network side, Linux is much stable,faster,makes sense and is the  
native ruby/ ruby on rails platform like most Network applications.  
you can code in Windows if you are used to but it will build you bad  
habits, since your application is going to be run on a network in your  
desktop it will make your live much easier if you get used to develop on  
linux. or even Mac OS X since is a Unix variant now a days.

Shai R. escribió:

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/b/d9b06d/32.png) [@boothy](https://www.ruby-forum.com/u/boothy)\
**Post date:** [March 17, 2008, 7:01pm UTC](https://www.ruby-forum.com/t/windows-and-linux-differences/132128/5 "2008-03-17T19:01:44Z")

</div>

Hi Roger,

I’ve tended to build apps in a \*nix environment and test it out on  
both platforms and in my experience I really haven’t had many  
problems. I’ve used the one-click binaries for windows to install the  
interpreter, ruby gems, rails, and a rdb server and this has made the  
process very simple. I have found that windows really isn’t as  
flexible to develop on as linux is and working from the command line  
is a little different (e.g. calling ruby ./script/console versus  
simply script/console). Depending on how you plan to deploy your app  
may also influence your decisions as well. Apache and Mongrel Cluster  
are very easy to work with on linux and I’ve only used Webrick or a  
single mongrel instance on windows to test so I can’t really speak to  
configuration and scaling. Coming from the world of open source and  
linux, I think there are probably some philosophical differences  
between the two platforms also. Support tends to be more in the  
linux / mac os arena. You might want to consider dual booting? This  
way you can have your cake (or should I say ruby) and eat it too.

- Mike