I would consider the following a list of support apps that are needed for Rails, but not installed on the production server:

SQLITE 3 (and sqlite3-ruby)
It seems sqlite3 database is not installed on the server. I use SQLite in my production environment, because it is very easy to backup and transfer the databse.

IMAGE MAGICK (and rmagick)
If you want to do any image resizing (for thumbnail generation) this would be the easiest way to do it. Also there is a popular plugin for uploading files (file_column) that relies on these libraries.

Ferret
This creates keyword indexes of model attributes, to aid in searching. I might not be as essential, but it is only a gem, so it shouldn't be too difficult to install.

What are your thoughts?

RMagick is already installed on HMS's servers I believe. I know I use it on my LB+ to resize images and compress them. I have heard of SQLite, but not the other one, but they both sound like good options. The possible Mongrel hosting, also know as possibly Rails Premium might involve a VPS, making installation of any gem possible.

The gem wasn't installed on my server, but support took care of that. They were also able to install ferret.

Here is the response regarding sqlite:


Which isn't a big problem since Rails is db agnostic, but it would have been nice to have this available as well.

Actually, Josh installed my RMagick too, but RMagick can be almost impossible to install. As one of the first people to have it installed, I remember how difficult it was, but Josh was very dedicated in solving a pretty big config issue, and i'm guessing that after my issue, HMS found a more efficient way to install it quickly. Kudos to Josh on that one, it was a long issue (but then again RMagick is almost impossible to install) that ended up in code troubleshooting.

Image Magick is already installed on all of our Linux servers, regardless of plan type. RMagick should be on all Ruby servers, in the event that it is not submit a ticket to support and we'll install it for you.

Ferret can be installed as well. The biggest issue with that gem right now is that it's still in heavy development. As I recall, at the time I installed the last stable release.

The problem with SQLite is that it's not a very efficient way to store data, and it puts the load of the database on the webserver since it's stored locally. All in all it's not intended for production use, other than perhaps a very small file which could just as easily be a CSV or other flat file. As Rails is db agnostic, as you said, this shouldn't be a problem for any of our customers, even if you develop locally with SQLite. When you upload your production code the database.yml file will reflect the data location.

We obviously can not anticipate what gems each and every customer will ever want and pre-install them on the systems. That said, it's still a fairly young offering and we're still developing our default build. We do have a list of our current standard gems at http://hostmysite.com/support/rubyonrails/gems/ As we see certain gems become more popular, we'll be adding to that list. Personally I see a need to have BlueCloth and/or RedCloth added to that list already. You can also run 'gem list' from SSH to see a list of all installed Gems and versions. If you come across a gem that is required for an app you are building or installing, or just one you want to try in your code, submit a request to support to have it installed. We use the same process with Perl and PHP/Pear modules as well.

Fair Enough. It makes more sense now that I know that you guys use a server (cluster?) dedicated for MySQL databases.