If you do not have the NetBeans 6.1 IDE, installed, go to the NetBeans IDE
6.1 Download Page, and download
a version of the IDE that contains Ruby support.
If you have a NetBeans IDE 6.1 installation that does not include Ruby support,
complete the following steps to add Ruby support to the IDE.
If your network uses a proxy, choose Tools > Options from the main
menu, select Manual Proxy Settings, type the HTTP
Proxy and Port for
your proxy, and click OK.
Choose Tools > Plugins from the main menu.
In the Plugins dialog box, click the Available Plugins tab,
and scroll to the Ruby category, as shown next.
Select the Ruby and Rails checkbox to obtain
Ruby support for the NetBeans IDE.
(Optional) Select the JRuby and Rails Distribution checkbox to
download and install the JRuby software
and the Ruby on Rails framework.
Note: You must have either Ruby or JRuby software
installed on your system to use the Ruby and
Rails distribution. If you do not have this software, you
must either install this plugin, or download and install
JRuby or Ruby software before working with Ruby projects
in the IDE.
(Optional) Select one or more of the following plugins:
Extra Ruby Color Themes. Provides additional editor
color themes for the Ruby file types
Ruby Extra Hints. Provides
code hints for Ruby that were developed after the
last release of the IDE
GlassFish V3 JRuby Integration. Enables
you to install Glassfish V3 instances into the IDE,
and to configure an instance as the current server in a
Ruby on Rails Project
Click Install.
The NetBeans IDE Installer appears.
In the NetBeans IDE Installer, click Next.
Read the license agreement, then select the I Accept the Terms in All
License Agreements option, and click Install.
After the installation is completed, select either Restart IDE Now or Restart
IDE Later and click Finish.
Configuring the IDE to Use Your Own Ruby Installation (Optional)
When first installed, the Ruby and Rails module registers
any Ruby installations that it detects on your system. To add
additional Ruby or JRuby installations, complete the
following steps.
In the IDE, choose Tools > Ruby Platforms from the main menu.
The Ruby Platform manager appears, as shown in the
following figure.
Perform one of the following steps to add
additional Ruby or JRuby platforms.
Click Autodetect Platforms to have the IDE
automatically detect and add the platforms that
are installed on your system.
Click Add Platform to add a specific platform, then
navigate to and select the Ruby binary, and click Open.
Gems are third-party Ruby libraries. The IDE provides a Ruby Gems manager for
adding and maintaining gems. You open the Ruby Gems manager by
choosing Tools > Ruby Gems from the main menu. The manager
contains the following tabs:
Updated. Lists which of the platform's installed gems
have a
newer version available.
Installed. Displays a list of the gems that
have been
installed for the selected Ruby platform. See the previous
section for information about registering Ruby platforms with
the IDE.
If you are using the bundled JRuby platform and the
IDE includes the JRuby and Rails Distribution plugin,
the list contains
the ActiveRecord JDBC Adapter gem and the Rails framework, as shown
in the next figure.
New Gems. Lists the gems that you can add
to the selected Ruby platform.
Settings. Use this tab to configure the proxy.
Note: The RubyGems
wiki page provides information about how to enable the Ruby Gems manager to
manage a native Ruby gems repository.
You can access databases from a JRuby on Rails application in
one of two ways.
MySQL Adapter. The MySQL adapter is included
with JRuby. You use this adapter just as you would with
a native Ruby on Rails application.
JDBC Adapter. As mentioned earlier, the JRuby and Rails Distribution
plugin includes the ActiveRecord JDBC Adapter gem, which
enables your JRuby on Rails application to access
database servers that provide JDBC 3.0 compliant drivers, such
as MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, HSQLDB, and Java DB (also known as Derby).
The JDBC driver must be a pure Java driver. At the time of this
writing, the ActiveRecord JDBC Adapter
does not work
with the SQLite JDBC driver.
To use the JDBC adapter in a Ruby on Rails project, select
the Access Database Using JDBC checkbox in the Database Configuration
step
when you create the project,
as shown in the next figure.
If you are using the MySQL or PostgreSQL
database server, the IDE automatically adds the bundled
driver to the JRuby classpath. For other database servers, the
IDE automatically adds the driver to the JRuby classpath if
you have registered the database server with the IDE. Otherwise,
you must obtain a JDBC 3.0 driver for your database server
and add the driver to the JRuby classpath. To add
the driver to the classpath,
right-click the project's node, choose Properties
from the pop-up menu, select the Java category,
and click Add JAR/Folder.
Note:
If the GlassFish server is registered, or if the IDE is configured to
use Sun Microsystems, Inc. Java SE Development Kit (JDK) 6.0, the IDE automatically
registers the Java DB database server with the IDE.
When you create a Ruby on Rails project, the IDE adds
the configurations to the database.yml for the database server
that you select in the Database Configuration step
of the Wizard. If you are
using a database server that is not in the drop-down list, you can
edit the database configuration
in the database.yml file after
you create the project.
Note: If your operating system's host file does not
contain localhost, change the host setting
in the configuration to 127.0.0.1. If errors occur when
you access the database from Rake commands or database migration commands,
try changing the host configuration to fix
the problem. You must restart the server for the change to take effect.
Note also that with some systems, the database setting must be in
lowercase letters.
Note: The Run Rake Task > db > create
menu option works only for MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQLite, and
SQLite3 adapters. For other database server adapters, including
the JDBC adapter, use one of the following steps to
create the database:
Manually create the database from a command window
using the commands that are appropriate for the database server.
For example, you would use a command similar to the following
to create a MySQL database.
mysqladmin -u fred -p create mydb_development
Click the Create DB button for the appropriate configuration
in the Database Configuration panel of the New Project Wizard.
In the Services window, expand Databases, then right-click
the database servers node and choose Create Database from the
pop-up menu.
Deploying a JRuby Application to GlassFish
By default, your JRuby applications run in the WEBrick browser. If you
want to deploy a JRuby application to the GlassFish application server,
you can package the application and its dependencies in a web archive
(WAR) file. Then you can make the WAR file available to the application server,
as shown in the following steps.
The deployed application uses the production database. Open
the database.yml file to ensure that the production configuration
is set correctly.
When you create your JRuby application, you are given the
option of adding rake targets to support application server deployment,
as shown in the following figure. If you intend to deploy to GlassFish,
you should select this checkbox.
If you have an existing JRuby project that does not offer this rake
target, complete the following steps to add the Goldspike plugin
to the project. This plugin adds rake tasks that enable you
to create WAR files.
In the Projects window, right-click
the project's
node
and choose Rails Plugins from the pop-up
menu, as shown in the following figure.
In the Rails Plugins dialog box,
click the New
Plugins tab.
If you do not see an entry for goldspike,
complete
the following steps to register the repository
that provides
the goldspike plugin.
Click the Repositories tab.
Click Add URL.
In the Add Repository URL dialog box,
type
http://jruby-extras.rubyforge.org/svn/trunk/rails-integration/plugins
and click OK, as
shown next.
After the repository is added, click
Close.
Click the New Plugins tab.
You should now see
an entry for goldspike.
Select the entry for goldspike, as
shown in the following figure, and click
Install.
Click OK to start the installation.
When the installation has succeeded, close
both the Installation and the Rails Plugins
dialog boxes.
Right-click the rubyweblog project
node and choose
Run Rake Task > Refresh List from
the pop-up menu, as shown next.
This choice forces the IDE to recognize the new war rake
targets that the Goldspike plugin added to the project.
To package your application in a WAR file, right-click the project's
node and choose Run Rake Task > War > Standalone > Create.
The IDE creates the WAR file and puts the file in the
project's top folder.
Place a copy of the newly created WAR file into the GlassFish
autodeploy
folder. For example, copy projects-folder/MyRubyApp/MyRubyApp.war
to glassfish-install-dir/domains/domain1/autodeploy.
In a browser, go to the URL for the application, for example,
http://localhost:8080/MyRubyApp.
Note: If you install the GlassFish V3 JRuby Integration
plugin, you can register a Glassfish V3 instance with the IDE,
and configure the instance as the current server in a Rails Project.
You can then use the Run Main Project button to run the application
on the GlassFish V3 instance. Note that all applications
are deployed at the root ("/") level, which might cause problems
if you are deploying more than one Rails application. This plugin
is in the experimental stages of development.
