Install Ruby 1.9.3 ( or Multiple Ruby Version ) on CentOS, RedHat using RVM

Ruby programming language is becoming is more popular these days. Ruby language was created by Yukihiro “Matz” Matsumoto and first published in 1995. This article will help you to install Ruby language in CentOS, RedHat system using RVM. For this article I am using CentOS 6.5. RVM provides easy set of commands to install single or multiple versions of Ruby on single server.

Step 1: Upgrade Packages

It is the best practice to keep your system up to date with latest packages. Before running below command make sure that update will not affect to your running apps ( if any )on server else skip it

# yum update

Step 2: Installing Recommended Packages

There are few developemnt libraries required to run Ruby on Linux. Use following command to install recommended packages on your server using yum.

# yum install gcc-c++ patch readline readline-devel zlib zlib-devel
# yum install libyaml-devel libffi-devel openssl-devel make
# yum install bzip2 autoconf automake libtool bison iconv-devel

Step 3: Install RVM ( Ruby Version Manager )

Install latest stable version of RVM on your system using following command. This command will automatically download all required files and install on your system.

# curl -L get.rvm.io | bash -s stable

[Sample Output]

  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  Current
                                 Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  Speed
100 20511  100 20511    0     0   1120      0  0:00:18  0:00:18 --:--:-- 19722
Downloading https://github.com/wayneeseguin/rvm/archive/stable.tar.gz
Creating group 'rvm'

Installing RVM to /usr/local/rvm/
Installation of RVM in /usr/local/rvm/ is almost complete:

  * First you need to add all users that will be using rvm to 'rvm' group,
    and logout - login again, anyone using rvm will be operating with `umask u=rwx,g=rwx,o=rx`.

  * To start using RVM you need to run `source /etc/profile.d/rvm.sh`
    in all your open shell windows, in rare cases you need to reopen all shell windows.

# Administrator,
#
#   Thank you for using RVM!
#   We sincerely hope that RVM helps to make your life easier and more enjoyable!!!
#
# ~Wayne, Michal & team.

In case of problems: http://rvm.io/help and https://twitter.com/rvm_io

Step 4: Setup RVM Environment

After installing RVM first we need to setup rvm environment using below command.

# source /etc/profile.d/rvm.sh

Step 5: Install Required Ruby Version

RVM provides option to manage multiple ruby version on single system. Use following command to install required version of Ruby.

# rvm install 1.9.3

[Sample Output]

Searching for binary rubies, this might take some time.
No binary rubies available for: centos/6/i386/ruby-1.9.3-p545.
Continuing with compilation. Please read 'rvm help mount' to get more information on binary rubies.
Checking requirements for centos.
Installing requirements for centos.
Updating system......
Installing required packages: libyaml-devel......
Requirements installation successful.
Installing Ruby from source to: /usr/local/rvm/rubies/ruby-1.9.3-p545, this may take a while depending on your cpu(s)...
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #downloading ruby-1.9.3-p545, this may take a while depending on your connection...
  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  Current
                                 Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  Speed
100 9802k  100 9802k    0     0   217k      0  0:00:45  0:00:45 --:--:--  393k
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #extracting ruby-1.9.3-p545 to /usr/local/rvm/src/ruby-1.9.3-p545.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #applying patch /usr/local/rvm/patches/ruby/GH-488.patch.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #applying patch /usr/local/rvm/patches/ruby/ssl_no_ec2m.patch.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #configuring..............................................
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #post-configuration.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #compiling...................................................................
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #installing........................
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #making binaries executable.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #downloading rubygems-2.2.2
  % Total    % Received % Xferd  Average Speed   Time    Time     Time  Current
                                 Dload  Upload   Total   Spent    Left  Speed
100  404k  100  404k    0     0  25393      0  0:00:16  0:00:16 --:--:--  335k
No checksum for downloaded archive, recording checksum in user configuration.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #extracting rubygems-2.2.2.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #removing old rubygems.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #installing rubygems-2.2.2...............
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #gemset created /usr/local/rvm/gems/[email protected]
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #importing gemset /usr/local/rvm/gemsets/global.gems.....
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #generating global wrappers.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #gemset created /usr/local/rvm/gems/ruby-1.9.3-p545
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #importing gemsetfile /usr/local/rvm/gemsets/default.gems evaluated to empty gem list
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #generating default wrappers.
ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #adjusting #shebangs for (gem irb erb ri rdoc testrb rake).
Install of ruby-1.9.3-p545 - #complete
WARNING: Please be aware that you just installed a ruby that is no longer maintained (2014-02-23), for a list of maintained rubies visit:

    http://bugs.ruby-lang.org/projects/ruby/wiki/ReleaseEngineering

Please consider upgrading to ruby-2.1.1 which will have all of the latest security patches.
Ruby was built without documentation, to build it run: rvm docs generate-ri

Step 6: Install Another Version ( if Required )

If you want using multiple versions of ruby, you can install it also using rvm else skip this step.

# rvm install 1.8.6

Step 7: Setup Default Ruby Version

Use rvm command to setup default ruby version to be used by applications.

# rvm use 1.9.3 --default 

Using /usr/local/rvm/gems/ruby-1.9.3-p545

Step 8: Check Current Ruby Version

Using following command you can check the current ruby version is used.

# ruby --version

ruby 1.9.3p545 (2014-02-24 revision 45159) [i686-linux]

I hope above steps will help you for installing multiple Ruby version using RVM.