If you followed my advice in the previous post, your Gemfile would look something like this:
source :rubygems gem 'rails', '3.0.3' gem 'devise', '1.1.5' gem 'redgreen', '1.2.2' gem 'capybara', '0.4.0'
There’s nothing wrong with this except that if you wanted to keep your gems up to date frequently it would be tedious to manually change all of these versions. Fortunately, we don’t always have to be this exact with the version numbers.
If the Ruby code you write never leaves your computer, then this article is not for you. But if you find yourself sharing Ruby code with others, or deploying your Ruby code to a web server, then you have a problem. And that problem is gem versions. Sooner or later, the version of a gem on your computer will not match the version of that gem on your production web server, and your cute little disruptive social media web app will fail in a steaming pile of 500 errors.
I’ve made some improvements to Alphabet Clock, most notably the inclusion of dates and developer libraries. Read the full story on Alphabet Clock’s blog.
