• merb_helpers which was previously in merb-plugins now moved to merb-more and got renamed merb-helpers.  What that means for you is that you probably want to install merb-helpers and change the reference in your init.rb from dependencies “merb_helpers” to dependencies “merb-helpers”
• People started reporting problems with templates not being reloaded in dev mode etc.. The reason is that we made some changes to the config/environments/development.rb file few weeks ago and people did not notice. Here is the new generated development.rb file. Note the following interesting change:

  c[:reload_templates] = true

  You will need to update this setting if you want Merb to auto reload your templates.

Also, if you didn’t read it yet, go check on Yehuda’s explanation of Merb new master process.

Finally, I have a bit of a bad news. We were hoping to release Merb 1.0 final during MerbCamp next week end. Unfortunately it looks like we will only release 1.0RC.

The reason behind this choice is simple, we have been adding a lot of features, fixed a lot of bugs and stabilized the API. However we need more feedback from users to be confident enough to release a final 1.0 release.

The easiest way to get started requires that you have git installed as well as a gem called thor.

I let you take care of installing git on your machine, Ruby dev without git became quite challenging since GitHub started ruling the Ruby OSS world.

sudo gem install wycats-thor -s http://gems.github.com

Hops, used primarily as a flavoring and stability agent in beer, and also in other beverages and in herbal medicine.

Thor is a sort if mix between rake, sake with a better argument parser and based on Ruby classes.

Thor on its own won’t be very helpful, we need some thor tasks.

Create a folder where you want to store Merb’s source code and cd in it.

Once there download the latest merb thor tasks:

curl -L http://merbivore.com/merb.thor > merb.thor

You can now look at the available task by doing

thor -T

At this point you be overwhelmed by the multitude of options, we are working on making things a be nicer for 1.0. But anyways, let’s get started:

sudo thor merb:edge --install

The command above will install extlib, merb-core and merb-more from git HEAD. You now have the latest version of Merb’s libs installed locally as gems.

You might also want to install Merb extra plugins, if that’s the case do:

 sudo thor merb:edge:plugins --install

If you decided to use DataMapper instead of ActiveRecord or Sequel, you will also need to install the gems you might need:

Install data_objects and an adapter: (replace mysql by the adapter you want to install)

 sudo thor merb:edge:do mysql --install

Install DataMapper core from Git HEAD

 sudo thor merb:edge:dm_core --install

Install DataMapper more from Git HEAD

 sudo thor merb:edge:dm_more --install

You should be all setup by now.

Next time you want to update, just come back to the same folder and do the same thing. Hopefully by then we will have a 1 task solution and will offer a merb-stack version of our gems to let you install everything at once with all setup done.

p.s: this post is dedicated Derek Neighbors

It’s hard to believe that in less that 20 days, Merb 1.0 will be released! We are all really happy to to be almost there but we have to be honest and admit that we are also under pressure.

We are all dreaming of a post 1.0 world but in the meantime we have to focus on last minutes bugs and optimization.

During the last week or so, we made a lot of progress, the API is now “almost” frozen and General Katz is focusing on making sure everything will be fine for D Day.

That reminds me that Katz showed me something amazing yesterday! I shouldn’t really talk about it but I’m sure it will stay between us. He was been working on optimizing the general memory consumption and my testing app (real app) went from 120MB of Private Memory used, to 70MB (using 4 processes). I can’t wait to use that on the field. I also hope my old Rails comrades will realize that running ~100Mb processes (x4) really isn’t efficient and event dangerous for the free Ruby world!

I also heard rumors that the higher officers are now using a new strategic tool called http://www.pivotaltracker.com which should help us streamline the process. We are still using LightHouse to track bugs and patches though. I’m not sure if this new “agile” tool will help, but I thought the approach is pretty interesting. What do you think?

You probably also saw my early report on bundling Merb apps, I’m quite happy about the process. Do you think you will deploy bundled/frozen apps or just use the system-wide gems?

Finally I hear a lot of talk about the new Router that’s available on Edge/HEAD. Officer Lerch wrote a nice wiki article covering the changes, you might want to read it.

Ohh before I forget, some courageous privates went to HEAD and use the 3rd party plugin called merb-auth. What they don’t know is that they need to change their routes to use the slices with the new router. (the new router requires no block variable) Also, if they look at the merb-auth branches they will notice a new mauth branch which is the new version of merb-auth, even better, more flexible than the previous version.

I hope everything is well for you, say Hi! to our friends for me.

- Merbist