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
Installing and managing a Gem is done through the gem command. To install a Gem such as Nokogiri which lets
you read and parse XML in Ruby:
$ gem install nokogiri
RubyGems will download the Nokogiri Gem from RubyGems.org and install it into your Ruby environment.
Finally, inside your Ruby program, load the Nokogiri gem and start parsing your XML:
require 'nokogiri'
Nokogiri.XML('<h1>Hello World</h1>')
For more information about how to use RubyGems, see our RubyGems basics guide at guides.rubygems.org
- RubyGems supports Ruby 3.0 or later.
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:
- Download from https://rubygems.org/pages/download, unpack, and
cdinto RubyGems' src - OR clone this repository and
cdinto the repository
Install RubyGems by running:
$ ruby setup.rb
For more details and other options, see:
$ ruby setup.rb --help
To upgrade to the latest RubyGems, run:
$ gem update --system
See UPGRADING for more details and alternative instructions.
RubyGems and Bundler are released in sync, although they do not share their major version number. It is planned that also their major version numbers will be sync'ed in the future.
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.
RubyGems uses rdoc for documentation. A compiled set of the docs can be viewed online at rubydoc.
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
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.
See https://bundler.io/compatibility for known issues.
RubyGems is managed by Ruby Central, a non-profit organization that supports the Ruby community through projects like this one, as well as RubyConf, RailsConf, and RubyGems.org. You can support Ruby Central by attending or sponsoring a conference, or by joining as a supporting member.
If you'd like to contribute to RubyGems, that's awesome, and we <3 you. Check out our guide to contributing for more information.
Everyone interacting in the RubyGems project’s codebases, issue trackers, chat rooms, and mailing lists is expected to follow the contributor code of conduct.