Peter Boling - Home

Rails Redo

2010-03-08T16:14:00Z

My environment for Ruby & Rails development began showing signs of wear and tear. I have been unable to get rvm to work for me at all. I dream about having the wonderful abilities it can provide, like independent sandboxes for rubies & gemsets, and configurations.

So when the latest gem upgrade (1.3.6) broke my older versions of rails (pre-2.3) things started to snowball uphill, and I decided to start over.

So when the latest gem upgrade (1.3.6) broke my older versions of rails (pre-2.3) things started to snowball uphill, and I decided to start over. There are lots of how to’s for from scratch rails setup on Snow Leopard. I utilized their guidance in doing my redo.

These are some of the more recent MacPorts Ruby Rails guides I found:

Juston Blake, Paul Sturgess, A Fresh Cup, Garrick VanBuren, Dave South

It is essentially from scratch, but I am not reinstalling my OS, or anything in the GUI. My goal is to get current on my open source software leveraging the MacPorts suite of awesome. I’ve never used it before, as I’ve always preferred to build my own stuff (ala hivelogic. However, since I am currently running low on blood, sweat and tears, I’ll see if I can’t get by with making use of other people’s blood, sweat and tears.

Prelim Flight testing: You need to have the latest Xcode tools installed (3.2.1 is both the minimum required, and the latest release as of this writing, and is newer than what came on the Snow Leopard DVD)

First save a copy of the gems you have installed for future reference:

gem list > installed_gems.txt

Delete /opt/local and /usr/local

sudo rm -rf /opt/local /usr/local

Install latest MacPorts via your favorite method. I used the .dmg.

edit PATH in /etc/profile (including the MySQL bin which we install a bit further down):

PATH="/opt/local/bin:/opt/local/sbin:/opt/local/lib/mysql5/bin/:/usr/local/bin:/usr/local/sbin:/bin:/sbin:/usr/bin:/usr/sbin"
export PATH=$PATH

Update MacPorts:

sudo port selfupdate
sudo port upgrade outdated

Install basic dev tools:

sudo port install mysql5
sudo port install mysql5-server
sudo port install ruby
sudo port install rb-rubygems
sudo port install rb-termios
sudo port install rb-mysql
sudo port install wget
sudo port clean --all sqlite3
# subversion install failed for me the first time I ran it, but then I ran clean -- all sqlite3 (above) and then the subversion install worked (not sure why, since the package it failed on was cyrus-sasl2)
sudo port install subversion 
sudo port install subversion-tools
sudo port install imagemagick

Setup MySQL Server:

sudo -u _mysql mysql_install_db5
launchctl load -w /Library/LaunchDaemons/org.macports.mysql5.plist
sudo ln -s /opt/local/var/run/mysql5/mysqld.sock /tmp/mysql.socksudo    /opt/local/lib/mysql5/bin/mysqladmin -u root password 'blahblahblah'
/opt/local/lib/mysql5/bin/mysqladmin -u root -h peter-bolings-macbook-2.local password 'blahblahblah'

Installed git with this little bash script:

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# Install git
mkdir -p $HOME/src
cd $HOME/src
package=git && version=1.7.0
curl -O http://kernel.org/pub/software/scm/git/$package-$version.tar.gz
tar xzf $package-$version.tar.gz
cd $package-$version && ./configure --prefix=/usr/local && make && sudo make install

List the gems you have installed now:

gem list
# I had a handful of gems that had been installed in strange places, and were still being seen by the new MacPorts install of ruby and gem.  Knowing that at least come of them were compiled, and knowing that I didn't want any issues I uninstalled all but gemcutter.
sudo gem uninstall RedCloth # ... and the rest

Update the one or two gems you still have:

sudo gem update

Install rvm and some rubies. Why so many rubies? I happen to like rubies. I also want to be able to test and benchmark against different rubies.

sudo gem install rvm
rvm install ruby-1.8.6-p399
rvm install ruby-1.8.7-p249
rvm install ruby-1.9.1-p378
rvm install ruby-1.9.2-preview1
rvm install rbx
rvm install ree
rvm install jruby

Set one of the precious rubies to be a default:

rvm 1.8.7 --default # either 1.9.1 or 1.8.7 is most common

I created several gemsets for several projects. This creates complete insulation and isolation for the dependencies of my projects. Another good option is to create gemsets for different versions of rails, or you could even do both.

rvm gemset create project1
rvm gemset create project2
rvm gemset create project3
rvm gemset create project4

Switch to using that gemset:

rvm 1.8.7%project1

If you are working on a project that uses a version of rails prior to 2.3 then rubygems versions newer than 1.3.5 may not work. rvm seems to sometimes install rubygems 1.3.6, and I have a project on rails 2.2.3 so I needed to set my 1.8.7 rvm ruby back to gem 1.3.5:

cd ~/.rvm/src
wget http://rubyforge.org/frs/download.php/60718/rubygems-1.3.5.tgz
tar xzf rubygems-1.3.5.tgz
cd rubygems-1.3.5
ruby setup.rb
cd ~/.rvm
rm -rf rubygems-1.3.5.tgz

Then install that project’s gem dependencies that are needed pre-rake gems:install!

gem install rails -v2.2.3 # or whatever version the project uses
gem install ...

Then create the development and test databases for the project.

Then rake gems:install

rake gems:install
RAILS_ENV=test rake gems:install

Install MySQL ruby bindings gem into each gemset that needs it:

gem install mysql -- --with-mysql-config=/opt/local/bin/mysql_config5

Options:

sudo port install freeciv # :)
sudo port install Pallet

Rails, Money, Float, Decimal

2009-11-18T02:47:00Z

The problems of using floats to represent monetary values have been well discussed elsewhere. So it sufficeth me to say, “do not ever do it”. Now if you are confronted with this haunting bit of code (written by someone else, of course), and want to correct the elusive $35.000000000000000001 you are charging people then I have good news! It can be done, but the road is not paved. These are the four biggest bumps I’ve run into. They might apply to other styles of AR stores, but these tips are from my experiences with MySQL.

Problem #1.

MySQL: Decimal columns with default values are marshalled into schema.rb and fixtures as nasty Ruby object dumps, which start with the # character, which is a comment in ruby, which breaks the entire file, and thereby breaks any part of the app that reads those files.

Solution to Problem #1:

A. In config/environment.rb:

  config.active_record.schema_format = :sql

B. Delete db/schema.rb

C. In a terminal:

rake db:structure:dump
rake db:test:clone_structure

D. Now you should be able to run your tests again.

Problem #2.

MySQL: Writing the migration, I thought this would be fine to convert a column that had been previously defined with a comment and a default:

    change_column :auction_payments, :transaction_amount, :decimal, :precision => 9, :scale => 2

But when I ran it the :default setting was lost, and the :comment was lost. I imagine other settings I might have had would’ve been lost as well. The DATA in the column was fine, but the column itself had lost some settings (which caused specs to fail, because those defaults are there for a reason!)

Solution to Problem #2:

A. Make sure you replay all the current column settings that still apply to the change_column method. Yes, you do have to restate all those defaults, and comments, etc.

Problem #3:

Rails: When the value in a decimal column comes back to rails as a 0 instead of typecasting it as 0:BigDecimal it gets typecast as 0:fixnum. If your code involving money does division then you will end up with numbers that need to be rounded with .round(2). If that code meets one of these 0:Fixnums, there will be a nasty explosion, because FixNum does not have a round method.

Solution to Problem #3:

(Please let me know if you have a better solution):

A. Create a new initializer file in config/intializers/fixnum_rounding_fix.rb and put this in it:

# When Our DECIMAL database columns have a value of 0 rails is casting the value to Fixnum, instead of a BigDecimal.
# This causes the round() method we call on instances of BigDecimal to fail.
# Fixnum does not have a round method with an argument, so this should not pose a problem
# Essentially if we are calling round on a fixnum, it is because we expected a BigDecimal, and it needs to be a BigDecimal.
Fixnum.class_eval do
  def round(*args)
    BigDecimal("#{self}")
  end
end

Problem #4:

All the old code that used the old Float columns and had been hacked somehow to work almost reliably with forced rounding (faked precision) is now broken!

Solution to Problem #4:

A. Search the project for usages of the custom hackety-hack rounding method that was being used, in my case it was my_number.round_with_precision(2), and rethink the math. Usually I was able to just replace my_number.round(2).

B. Run the specs (you do have tests, right?) and make sure they all still pass. If they do not, then perhaps they’re not testing what they need to be testing?

Unpack your unruly gems!

2009-11-13T20:33:00Z

Unpacking Gems doesn’t always work in some projects for various annoying reasons.

So this is just my hammer for the nail.

Some gems really don’t like to be unpacked… see:


def muck_gems
  ['capistrano_mailer','super_exception_notifier','sanitize_email','csv_pirate']
end

# execute commands in a different directory
def inside(dir, &block)
  FileUtils.cd(dir) { block.arity == 1 ? yield(dir) : yield }
end

desc "unpacks all muck gems into vendor/gems using versions installed on the local machine." 
task :unpack do
  gem_path = File.join(File.dirname(__FILE__), 'vendor', 'gems')
  FileUtils.mkdir_p(gem_path) unless File.exists?(gem_path)
  inside gem_path do
    muck_gems.each do |gem_name|
      system("gem unpack #{gem_name}")
      #Don't want it in vendor/gems, needs to be in gem's own folder, and that's harder to achieve
      dir = Dir.entries(gem_path).select {|x| x.match(gem_name)}.first
      system("gem specification #{gem_name} > #{gem_path}/#{dir}/.specification")
    end
  end
end

References: justinball.com metaclass.org

My Cherub

2009-11-04T15:58:00Z

My little cherub of a daughter turned one year old just three weeks ago. She also has a congenital heart disease called tetralogy of fallot. Two days ago we were went down to Riley Children’s Hospital and had her heart tested. When we met with the doctor afterwards we learned the unsettling news that she would need another open heart surgery, and that it would need to be soon. She has been taking a beta blocker to calm her heart down, and we were hoping that it would slow the growth of the muscle, and lower the pressure at the pulmonary artery, because it was four times what is healthy. Instead it is now eight times what is healthy. That might explain why she turned blue-purlpe, for a few minutes, two weeks ago. It might also have been a factor in the seizure she appeared to have last week. So on Earl’s birthday she will be having her second open heart surgery. This has been a difficult trial for my wife and I. I know that God is in control, and I put my faith in him, and his will for us.

Contact

2009-10-12T07:06:00Z

My cell is the best way to get a hold of me.

FaceBook: http://www.facebook.com/peter.boling
GitHub: http://github.com/pboling/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/galtzo

cell: 765-760-2012
email: peter.boling@peterboling.com
AIM: djpeteplzdance
jabber: peter.boling@gmail.com
skype: peter.boling
lang: English, Spanish, Portuguese

Portfolio

2009-10-12T06:54:00Z

I work on Neighborino.com, which is a neighborhood socialization, HOA management, and communication tool. My relationship with Neighborino is a profit sharing model, so the cost to them is minimal as they are in the launch phase. Check out the demo site to see a functioning HOA website.

I am a partner at Sagebit.com and am a major part of developing the following sites:

Sagebit.com
CartaBuzz.com
MonkeyStub.com
YetiMail.com (Currently Offline)
TeamClip.com (Currently Offline)

I have worked on many other sites that I am unable to name publicly.

Peter Boling Resumé

2009-10-12T06:53:00Z

I am an experienced Ruby on Rails Web Application programmer. I have been using rails as my main development platform for almost 5 years. I am an experienced System Administrator on Linux, Mac, and Windows computers. I speak three languages, English, Spanish, and Portuguese, fluently.

I have built, deployed and managed several top 5000 websites.

Download my reusmé here.