Rails new app workflow

These are the steps I take when creating a new Rails app, documented here for when I forget.

Create app

rails new <app_name>

cd <app_name>

git

git init

git add .

git commit –m ‘Initial commit’

Remember: Rails generates a .gitignore file for us.

rvm and gemsets

rvm gemset create <app_name>

echo ‘rvm use 1.9.2@<app_name>’ >> .rvmrc

echo ‘.rvmrc’ >> .gitignore

Creates a .rvmrc file in current directory that way when you cd into this directory rvm automatically switches to the correct version of ruby and the gemset we just created.

Change in and out of the directory to get rvm to kick in:

cd ..

cd <app_name>

Gemfile

Edit ./Gemfile and add the following lines.

gem ‘haml’

group :test do

    gem ‘rspec’

    gem ‘rspec-rails’

end

Then install and run bundler:

gem install bundler

bundle install

rspec

Generate the rspec files:

rails g rspec:install

Connecting Ruby on Rails to Microsoft SQL Server

NOTE: These instructions are now seriously out of date. You may want to check out my always up to date ebook instead. The secret of connecting Rails to Microsoft SQL Server

It appears rails does not connect to MS SQL Server right out of the box. You need to do the following to get the connection to work:

Get the latest source distribution of Ruby-DBI and copy the file:

bdi-0.1.0/lib/dbd/ADO.rb

to:

c:/ruby/lib/ruby/site_ruby/1.8/DBD/ADO/ADO.rb

NOTE: The ADO directory does not exist on a standard install, you will need to create it.

Then simply set up your railsapp/config/database.yml

Here’s an example for reference:

development:
  adapter: sqlserver
  database: database_name
  host: server_name
  username: user_name
  password: your_pw_here

Migrations 'Zombie State' and MS SQL

Getting ‘Zombie State’ errors with migrations and MS SQL Server? Add the following to your config/enviroment.rb:

ActiveRecord::Base.connection.instance_variable_get("@connection")["AutoCommit"] = false

Pluralize table names – no thanks!

Sorry I just can’t live with plural table names, I just can’t get my head around it! Luckily it is easily turned off. In RadRails there is a simple tick box when creating the project which simply adds the following line to the end of your applications config/environment.rb file:

# Include your application configuration below
ActiveRecord::Base.pluralize_table_names = false

I may live to regret not embracing plural table names but I doubt it!

Setting up Ruby on Rails

I’m going to give Ruby on Rails (RoR) a try on my Windows XP machine. Here’s how I’ve set it up…

1. Install Ruby
   Using the Ruby One Click Installer Ruby One Click Installer (v184-16 release candidate 1)
2. Setup proxy

   set HTTP_PROXY=http://wwwcache:8080

3. GEM install Ruby on Rails

   gem install rails --include-dependencies

4. Install RadRails
   I also downloaded and installed the latest RadRails (v0.6.1)
5. Database
   I’m going to try rails with our dev MS-SQL server so no database to install. No doubt lots of configuring to do though!

NOTE:

There appears to be a problem with the WEBrick web server in this setup. I couldn’t find the answer on google but I did find a work around. If you run the WEBrick server using the standard ruby script\server you will get the following error:

ruby script\server
=> Booting WEBrick...
=> Rails application started on http://0.0.0.0:3000
=> Ctrl-C to shutdown server; call with --help for options
[2006-04-04 13:20:35] INFO  WEBrick 1.3.1
[2006-04-04 13:20:35] INFO  ruby 1.8.4 (2005-12-24) [i386-mswin32]
[2006-04-04 13:20:35] WARN  TCPServer Error: Bad file descriptor - bind(2)
c:/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/webrick/utils.rb:73:in `initialize': Bad file descriptor - bind(2) (Errno::EBADF)
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/webrick/utils.rb:73:in `create_listeners'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/webrick/utils.rb:70:in `create_listeners'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/webrick/server.rb:75:in `listen'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/webrick/server.rb:63:in `initialize'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/1.8/webrick/httpserver.rb:24:in `initialize'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-1.1.0/lib/webrick_server.rb:59:in `dispatch'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-1.1.0/lib/commands/servers/webrick.rb:59
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/site_ruby/1.8/rubygems/custom_require.rb:21:in `require'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/activesupport-1.3.0/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:136:in `require'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/rails-1.1.0/lib/commands/server.rb:30
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/site_ruby/1.8/rubygems/custom_require.rb:21:in `require'
        from c:/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/activesupport-1.3.0/lib/active_support/dependencies.rb:136:in `require'
        from script/server:3

There appears to be some problem binding to the port 3000, netstat shows nothing running on port 3000 so I’ve no idea what is causing it. Any hoose a work around is simply to run on another port:

ruby script\server --port=8000

If I do find out what is causing the problem I’ll update this post.