Section :: Blog

Ruby In Steel - New Free Edition includes Visual Studio

by Huw Collingbourne

Ruby and Rails development in VS 2008

Monday 6 October 2008.

SapphireSteel Software today released a free edition of Ruby In Steel, the Ruby and Rails IDE for Microsoft Visual Studio 2008.

IMPORTANT: Please note that this article refers only to the free Personal Edition which was release in October 2008. This edition has a very small subset of the features of the Developer Edition. If you have technical comments and queries about either edition, please leave these in THE FORUM rather than as comment threads to this article.

Ruby In Steel Personal Edition (PE) 2008 provides all the tools needed to develop and maintain Ruby or Rails projects including syntax sensitive customizable code coloring and code folding, numerous coding tools such as auto-indenting, code reformatting, bracket and keyword matching and integrated consoles to allow users to interact with the Ruby interpreter in docked or floating windows. Ruby In Steel PE 2008 even includes a free copy of Visual Studio 2008 for Ruby!

Ruby In Steel PE 2008 is available for personal or commercial development. It does not require registration and it does not time out. It comes with an ‘All-in-One’ installer to allow users to install all the software required including: Visual Studio 2008 (‘Shell edition’), Ruby, Rails, MySQL and Ruby In Steel. Alternatively, users who already own a commercial edition of Visual Studio 2008 may install Ruby In Steel into that.

The ‘All-in-one’ installer

Ruby In Steel PE 2008 provides numerous features for Ruby and Rails developers such as:

Code Coloring (Ruby)
Code Coloring (Erb/RHTML)
Code Folding (Ruby)
Code Folding (Erb/RHTML)
Color schemes/customization
Bracket matching (move cursor)
Bracket highlighting
Keyword..end matching (move cursor)
Block comment/uncomment
Multi-level undo/redo
Tabbed (multi-file) editing
Split-window editing
Auto Indent/outdent
Smart Indenting
Auto end-completion (e.g. auto add ‘end’ after ‘def’)
Code Reformatting
Project Management in the Solution Explorer
Open command prompt in selected directory
Dockable IRB Console
Run Ruby in integrated interactive console
Comprehensive PDF User Guide/Manual
Integrated Help
All-in-one Installer
Supports Ruby 1.8.6 and 1.8.7, Rails 1, Rails 2.1

DOWNLOAD RUBY IN STEEL PE 2008 (175Mb)

IMPORTANT: Be Sure To Read The Documentation!

The following documents are all included in the zip file:

ReadMe_Personal_Edition.html
Installation Intructions.pdf
Ruby In Steel Manual 1_1_5.pdf

The zip archive also contains a free eBook (PDF) Ruby tutorial, The Little Book Of Ruby, plus all the source code ready to load as a single project into Ruby In Steel. The source code is contained in littlebookofruby2_source.zip.

Ruby In Steel PE 2008 includes provides project management in the Visual Studio Solution Explorer (top right), has interactive docked Ruby and IRB consoles (screen bottom) and includes a powerful Ruby editor with code coloring, code folding, auto-formatting, bracket-matching, keyword-end matching, smart indenting, block commenting and much more...

The editor also supports Rails template files (.ERb or .rhtml). You can import existing Ruby or Rails projects using the Import Wizard

The editor is highly customizable. You can create your own named color schemes or use one of the ready-to-go color schemes supplied with the software

Ruby In Steel PE 2008 is a subset of our entry-level commercial IDE, Ruby In Steel Text Edition. It does not include the integrated debugger supplied with the Text Edition, nor does it come with a library of Ruby auto-expanding code snippets. Please note that no technical support is offered for Ruby In Steel PE 2008.

For information on our commercial IDEs, please refer to the Ruby In Steel Developer Overview, Ruby In Steel Text Edition Overview, The Feature List and The Download Page (where you can download free 60-day trials of Ruby In Steel Text and Developer editions).

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Comment on this article

Forum

Ruby In Steel - New Free Edition includes Visual Studio
11 October 2009, by steller

interesting

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Double-clicking on latter lines of Ruby error output does not bring you to the line of code
29 July 2009

ie:

./foo.rb:34:in `contains’: undefined method `<=’ for
nil:NilClass (NoMethodError)
from ./foo_bar.rb:23:in `find!’
from ./foo_baz.rb:28:in `allocate?’
from ./main.rb:200:in `find’
from ./main.rb:154:in `create?’

When you double-click on any other line, in the "Ruby Console" of VS2008, it does not bring you to the line and file in question. It only works on the top line. I believe this feature is essential.

Reply to this message
- Double-clicking on latter lines of Ruby error output does not bring you to the line of code
  29 July 2009, by Dermot Hogan
  
  I’ve just looked at the the code that does the error navigation from the console - and I have to fess up to the fact that it isn’t very clever. It’s stuff I wrote when I first started on RiS when I didn’t know how to handle Visual Studio very well.
  
  I’ve entered this as a bug and I’ll probably fix it in version 1.5.
  
  Dermot
  
  Reply to this message
Debugger Error in Developer Edition
26 July 2009

The debugger seems to be failing to evaluate the expressions for local and ivars.

Sample error msg:

failed: expecting "EOF", found ’|’ : argnets|nil|NilClass|0|args|[#
where ... continues on with the rest of my obj information

Am I doing something wrong?

Thanks

Reply to this message
- Debugger Error in Developer Edition
  26 July 2009, by Huw Collingbourne
  
  This seems to indicate that this is some object type which, for some reason, cannot be ’inspected’. Can you let me know exactly what type of object this is?
  
  By the way, which version of Ruby In Steel are you using? Also, what is the project type (pure ruby, Rails etc.) and exactly which version of Ruby are you using (e.g. 1.8.5. or 1.8.6)?
  
  best wishes
  
  Huw
  
  Reply to this message
  - Debugger Error in Developer Edition
    26 July 2009
    
    Hi thanks for the speedy reply. I am using Ruby in Steel Dev Trial 1.4 . Ruby 1.8.6 installed from the Windows one-click. The project type was an empty Ruby proj from which I loaded my .rb files typed up before. There is absolutely no "rails" involved (its not even installed on my system).
    
    My class is a custom class, if thats what you meant? I mean, the IVARS themselves are a mix - some are custom classes, some are simple arrays or built-in types.
    
    — does this mean I need to define a inspect method stub for my classes in order for Cyclon to parse?
    
    Reply to this message
    - Debugger Error in Developer Edition
      26 July 2009, by Huw Collingbourne
      
      We probably need to step through this with you in more detail. Can you contact support using the address or link on this page: http://www.sapphiresteel.com/spip.php?page=contacts.
      
      If you can mail us a sample of some code that would be perfect. We will at least need to know more about your custom class. There are unfortunately many versions of ’inspect’ which Ruby developers have implemented and the format of the data returned by ’custom inspectors’ can often be very difficult to parse so the more details you can give us the better.
      
      best wishes
      
      Huw
      
      Reply to this message
ERROR Creating New Ruby Proj for Ruby In Steel PE with VS 2008
4 July 2009

I am using Visual Studio 2008 Professional Edition.

Error Msg:

The project file ’G:\Program Files\SappireSteel Software\Ruby in Steel\v1.0\Templates\Projects\Empty Ruby Project.stproj’cannot be opened.

The project type is not supported by this installation.

Thanks for any help.

Reply to this message
- ERROR Creating New Ruby Proj for Ruby In Steel PE with VS 2008
  4 July 2009, by Huw Collingbourne
  
  Can you check this FAQ and let us know if this is the solution: http://www.sapphiresteel.com/Cannot-open-Project-error-The
  
  best wishes
  
  Huw
  
  Reply to this message
  - ERROR Creating New Ruby Proj for Ruby In Steel PE with VS 2008
    22 July 2009
    
    Yes this fixes it ; however, I just realized that there is no intellisense for either default Ruby classes or user-created ones — if there were such a feature, I would gladly pay for your product :)
    
    Reply to this message
    - ERROR Creating New Ruby Proj for Ruby In Steel PE with VS 2008
      22 July 2009, by Huw Collingbourne
      
      Be aware that the features of the free edition do not represent those of the Developer Edition. Ruby In Steel Developer has fast IntelliSense for both standard and user-written classes, objects, methods and parameters. In fact, our IntelliSense analyses code as it is written so if you have an object xxx in two places in the same code and its class is different in both places, the IntelliSense will show this when code completion lists appear. See our overview of Ruby In Steel Developer then be sure to download and try out our 60-day evaluation copy.
      
      best wishes
      
      Huw
      
      Reply to this message
      
      ERROR Creating New Ruby Proj for Ruby In Steel PE with VS 2008
      26 July 2009
      
      Actually, how do you see instance vars of the obj’s scope you are currently in when debugging? I only see local vars in the "Locals" window — I can see ivars of the local vars, but not the ivars of the obj I’m in...
      
      Thanks
      
      Reply to this message
      
      ERROR Creating New Ruby Proj for Ruby In Steel PE with VS 2008
      26 July 2009, by Huw Collingbourne
      
      Are you using the Watch window? The Locals window shows (literally) local vars. You can enter (or drag and drop) anything into the Watch window, though. Alternatively, just hover your mouse over the variable name in the code editor and use the debug tooltip to look inside the object.
      
      This tutorial may help clarify some of the debugging options:
      
      http://www.sapphiresteel.com/Debugging-Ruby-with-the-Cylon
      
      best wishes
      
      Huw
      
      Reply to this message
Ruby In Steel - New Free Edition includes Visual Studio
15 October 2008, by jj

That’s great, I’m testing it right now... However, it seems like the fonts and coloring are "wrong" (the background color is an ugly dark blue in ERB for example) and loading a different style doesn’t change that. Is that intentional?

Reply to this message
- Ruby In Steel - New Free Edition includes Visual Studio
  15 October 2008, by Huw Collingbourne
  
  This can occur in some circumstances if the Visual Studio font cache is not correctly built or refreshed. In most cases, selecting the ’Refresh Fonts and Colors’ option from the Ruby menu will fix this (you may need to restart VS afterwards). If not, see this FAQ: http://sapphiresteel.com/Some-of-the-colors-in-the-editor.
  
  best wishes
  
  Huw
  
  Reply to this message
Installing VS2008 on a machine with VS2005 already installed.
7 October 2008, by BGriffin

I don’t see any comments regarding whether installing VS 2008 will interfere with an existing installation of VS 2005 on the same drive..??

Reply to this message
- Installing VS2008 on a machine with VS2005 already installed.
  7 October 2008, by Huw Collingbourne
  
  VS2005 and VS2008 can be installed on a single drive.
  
  However, you may only install 1 copy of Ruby In Steel per PC. So if you have VS2005 already installed, you can also install Ruby In Steel PE using its copy of VS2008 (for example). But if you later decided to buy a VS2005 version of Ruby In Steel for your existing Visual Studio 2005 installation, you would have to uninstall Ruby In Steel 2008 first.
  
  best wishes
  
  Huw
  
  Reply to this message