RubyGems
RubyGems is a package management framework for Ruby.
A package (also known as a library) contains a set of functionality that can be invoked by a Ruby program, such as reading and parsing an XML file.
We call these packages "gems" and RubyGems is a tool to install, create, manage and load these packages in your Ruby environment.
RubyGems is also a client for RubyGems.org, a public repository of Gems that allows you to publish a Gem
that can be shared and used by other developers. See our guide on publishing a Gem at guides.rubygems.org
Getting Started
Installing and managing a Gem is done through the gem command. To install a Gem such as Faraday:
gem install faraday
RubyGems will download the Faraday Gem from RubyGems.org and install it into your Ruby environment.
Finally, inside your Ruby program, load the Faraday gem and start hacking:
require 'faraday'
response = Faraday.get('https://rubygems.org')
# do something with `response`...
For more information about how to use RubyGems, see our RubyGems basics guide at guides.rubygems.org
Bundler
Bundler makes sure Ruby applications run the same code on every machine. It is developed in this repository and ships with Ruby.
It does this by managing the gems that the application depends on. Given a list of gems, it can automatically download and install those gems, as well as any other gems needed by the gems that are listed. Before installing gems, it checks the versions of every gem to make sure that they are compatible, and can all be loaded at the same time. After the gems have been installed, Bundler can help you update some or all of them when new versions become available. Finally, it records the exact versions that have been installed, so that others can install the exact same gems.
For example, these commands will allow you to use Bundler to manage the rspec gem for your application:
bundle init
bundle add rspec
bundle install
bundle exec rspec
For more information about how to use Bundler, see the guides at guides.rubygems.org
Requirements
- RubyGems supports Ruby 3.0 or later.
Installation
RubyGems is already installed in your Ruby environment, you can check the version you have installed by running gem --version in your terminal emulator.
In some cases Ruby & RubyGems may be provided as OS packages. This is not a
recommended way to use Ruby & RubyGems. It's better to use a Ruby Version
Manager, such as rbenv or
chruby. If you still want to use the
version provided by your OS package manager, please also use your OS package
manager to upgrade rubygems, and disregard any other installation instructions
given below.
If you would like to manually install RubyGems:
Install RubyGems by running:
$ ruby setup.rb
For more details and other options, see:
$ ruby setup.rb --help
Upgrading RubyGems
To upgrade to the latest RubyGems, run:
$ gem update --system
See UPGRADING for more details and alternative instructions.
Release policy
RubyGems and Bundler share a version number and are released together.
The release policy is somewhat similar to the release policy of Ruby itself:
- Frequent patch releases (every 2-4 weeks) including bug fixes, minor
enhancements, small features, or even medium sized features declared as
experimental for battle testing.
- Yearly minor releases including bigger features, and minor breaking changes
(affecting only edge cases and a very small set of users).
- Occasional major releases (replacing yearly minors) including major breaking
changes.
Documentation
RubyGems uses rdoc for documentation. A compiled set of the docs
can be viewed online at docs.ruby-lang.org.
RubyGems also provides a comprehensive set of guides which covers numerous topics such as
creating a new gem, security practices and other resources at https://guides.rubygems.org
Getting Help
Filing Tickets
Got a bug and you're not sure? You're sure you have a bug, but don't know
what to do next? In any case, let us know about it! The best place
for letting the RubyGems team know about bugs or problems you're having is
on the RubyGems issues page at GitHub.
Bundler Compatibility
See https://guides.rubygems.org/bundler-compatibility/ for known issues.
Supporting
RubyGems is a community project. Please consider sponsoring individual contributors for their great OSS
work.
In addition, Ruby Central administers grant-funded work for improvements to ruby/rubygems, as well as running
RubyGems.org (the service). You can support Ruby Central by attending or sponsoring
a RubyConf, or by joining as a supporting member.
Contributing
If you'd like to contribute to RubyGems, that's awesome, and we <3 you. Check out our guide to contributing for more information.
Code of Conduct
Everyone interacting in the RubyGems project’s codebases, issue trackers, chat rooms, and mailing lists is expected to follow the contributor code of conduct.
