Installing Ruby on Linux and Other UNIX-Style Systems

If you are using a UNIX-like system such as Linux, you usually have a choice:

• Install a prebuilt package. Chances are that a prebuilt Ruby is available for your system. Make sure that you also install RubyGems to get the standard Ruby third-party code manager. If you use Debian Linux or one of its derivatives (which include the very popular Ubuntu Linux), you should be aware that because of philosophical differences about how software should be packaged, RubyGems is not available as a prebuilt Debian package. If you find yourself in this bind, you might consider building Ruby from source.

• Build Ruby from source. Building your Ruby environment from source is not really very difficult. Simply download the software and follow the instructions in the README file. After you finish with Ruby itself, you will also want to pull down the RubyGems source and build that, too.