In Debian, the Ruby distribution is split up into many small, separate packages. You might have to tediously install package after package while you find out what is (still) missing when you are developing.

The following command will install all packages and libraries with “ruby1.8” in the package name, which should lead to a more or less complete installation of ruby on your machine:

apt-get install `apt-cache search -n ruby1.8 | cut -d ' ' -f 1` irb1.8 rdoc1.8 ri1.8

A few additional packages will be listed as “recommended” or “suggested” before the download/installation starts. You can cut/paste these names into the above command line; some of these packages won’t be available however, so you will have to reedit the resulting command line until it is accepted by apt-get.

See also RailsOnDebian for more information.

category:Howto