installing mysql gem on ubuntu + ERROR: Error installing mysql

If you are facing below issue while installing mysql gem on ubuntu then you need to install 'libmysqlclient-dev' library.

manohar@manohar-Inspiron-1525:~$ gem install mysql
Building native extensions.  This could take a while...
ERROR:  Error installing mysql:
    ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension.

        /home/manohar/.rvm/rubies/ruby-1.9.2-p290/bin/ruby extconf.rb
checking for mysql_query() in -lmysqlclient... no
checking for main() in -lm... yes
checking for mysql_query() in -lmysqlclient... no
checking for main() in -lz... yes
checking for mysql_query() in -lmysqlclient... no
checking for main() in -lsocket... no
checking for mysql_query() in -lmysqlclient... no
checking for main() in -lnsl... yes
checking for mysql_query() in -lmysqlclient... no
checking for main() in -lmygcc... no
checking for mysql_query() in -lmysqlclient... no
*** extconf.rb failed ***
Could not create Makefile due to some reason, probably lack of
necessary libraries and/or headers.  Check the mkmf.log file for more
details.  You may need configuration options.

Provided configuration options:
    --with-opt-dir
    --without-opt-dir
    --with-opt-include
    --without-opt-include=${opt-dir}/include
    --with-opt-lib
    --without-opt-lib=${opt-dir}/lib
    --with-make-prog
    --without-make-prog
    --srcdir=.
    --curdir
    --ruby=/home/manohar/.rvm/rubies/ruby-1.9.2-p290/bin/ruby
    --with-mysql-config
    --without-mysql-config
    --with-mysql-dir
    --without-mysql-dir
    --with-mysql-include
    --without-mysql-include=${mysql-dir}/include
    --with-mysql-lib
    --without-mysql-lib=${mysql-dir}/lib
    --with-mysqlclientlib
    --without-mysqlclientlib
    --with-mlib
    --without-mlib
    --with-mysqlclientlib
    --without-mysqlclientlib
    --with-zlib
    --without-zlib
    --with-mysqlclientlib
    --without-mysqlclientlib
    --with-socketlib
    --without-socketlib
    --with-mysqlclientlib
    --without-mysqlclientlib
    --with-nsllib
    --without-nsllib
    --with-mysqlclientlib
    --without-mysqlclientlib
    --with-mygcclib
    --without-mygcclib
    --with-mysqlclientlib
    --without-mysqlclientlib

Use below command to resolve above issue-

manohar@manohar-Inspiron-1525:~$ sudo apt-get install libmysqlclient-dev

Ruby on Rails Development Platform in Enterprise

Ruby on Rails is growing in enterprises in India, but they are still lagging with popular development platforms like Mac or linux. As it's difficult for them to afford Mac and they cannot use Linux based Operating Systems (OS) on host machines due to security constraints or to use some windows based apps. So I decided to use Virtual Machine on my Windows based Host System.

Here is configuration of my host system:
Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, RAM: 2GB, Operating System: Windows 7 Enterprise

Now To use Ubuntu (Linux based OS) with above configuration, follow below steps-

1. Download and Install VMWare Player which is free for personal non-commercial use. VMware Player is only distributable with written permission from VMware. So don't share the exe/setup, download it separately.

2. Download ISO of Ubuntu.

3. Create a New Virtual Machine for Ubuntu using VMware Player. Just follow 'Next' Its simple. It takes default 512 MB of RAM but I did allocate 896 MB of RAM as I had 2 GB of RAM. (It might install required files.)

Now you have Ubuntu ready on your windows based system. To install Ruby and Rails using RVM please follow below steps-

1. To install RVM you need git. Run below command to install git-
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ sudo apt-get install git
And then follow installation steps for RVM here.
OR
Run below command in terminal-

ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ bash < <(curl -s https://rvm.beginrescueend.com/install/rvm)

And then follow steps mentioned in output of above command to update .bashrc.

2. After installing RVM successfully follow below steps to install ruby and rails. Steps mentioned below are used to avoid the issue mentioned here.
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ rvm pkg install zlib
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ rvm pkg install openssl
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ rvm install 1.8.7 -C --with-openssl-dir=$rvm_path/usr  --with-zlib-dir=$rvm_path/usr

3. Create new gemset using rvm.
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ rvm gemset create rails_3

4. Check available version of ruby and gemset.
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ rvm list
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ rvm gemset list

5. Set default versions of Ruby and Rails using rvm. I am using ruby-1.8.7-p352@rails_3 as I have installed ruby 1.8.7 and created gemset named as rails_3.
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ rvm use --default ruby-1.8.7-p352@rails_3

6. Now you can install rails.
ubuntu@ubuntu:~$ gem install rails

You are ready with ruby and rails, Now you need database. You can simply install mysql or postgresql using apt-get install command or from ubuntu software center.

I wanted to use Oracle but I didn't install it on my ubuntu system (virtual machine) as it's running less than 1 GB RAM which is kind of minimum requirement for oracle database. And I have already installed Oracle XE on my host system so I am going to use it using Host IP address in my database.yml of rails app.

To use oracle I need to install ruby-oci8 and activerecord-oracle_enhanced-adapter gems.

1. Follow steps here to install ruby-oci8 using InstantClient.

2. If you are facing any issues to install gem ruby-oci8, you have to set path for LD_LIBRARY_PATH in your .bashrc. Eg: export LD_LIBRARY_PATH="/opt/oracle/instantclient_11_2"

Apart from these you have to install few required libraries and application like tortoisesvn, NetBeans(IDE) etc. Currently I am using Ubuntu just by using 896MB of RAM and it works fine.

Few things to remember while using this combination-

1. Increase RAM size allocated from 512MB, if you are going to use NetBeans as it takes bit lot memory.

2. Increase number of Processors to 2 if you have core 2 Duo, Default its set to only 1. It really helps.

3. From Virtual Machine Settings -> Hardware -> CD/DVD Device, dis-select 'Connect at power on' check box as you may not have CD-ROM available.

4. CTRL+G is used to enter into Virtual Machine and CTRL+ALT get out of it.
    CTRL+ALT+DELETE call is taken by both Virtual Machine and host system. So make sure you will be using host system if you want to lock it.

5. Add terminal in SYSTEM->PREFERENCES->KEYBORAD SHORTCUTS.
You can use-  Name: CTRL+ALT_DELETE  and Command: gnome-editor 

6. If you want to have shared folder between host system and virtual system, refer the article here to update Virtual Machine Tools first and then you can simply add folders from Virtual Machine Settings -> Options -> Shared Folders. You will get them in /mnt/hgfs

Note: I was using a network where I was able to download all required software.

no such file to load -- zlib

If you have installed rvm and then ruby and now facing below issue while installing rails-
manohar@manohar-Inspiron-1525:~$ gem install rails

ERROR:  Loading command: install (LoadError)

no such file to load -- zlib

ERROR:  While executing gem ... (NameError)
uninitialized constant Gem::Commands::InstallCommand

Below steps should fix your problem as it worked for me.

$ rvm pkg install zlib
$ rvm remove 1.9.2
$ rvm install 1.9.2 --with-zlib-dir=$rvm_path/usr


HEROKU:

If you need to use you might face below problem after installing heroku gem and running heroku commands:

no such file to load -- net/https.

Try running apt-get install libopenssl-ruby (LoadError)

Below steps will work:

$ rvm remove 1.9.2 

$ rvm pkg install openssl
$ rvm install 1.9.2 -C --with-openssl-dir=$rvm_path/usr

And to resolve both zlib and libopenssl problem use below steps:

$ rvm remove 1.9.2 

$ rvm pkg install zlib

$ rvm pkg install openssl

$ rvm install 1.9.2 -C --with-openssl-dir=$rvm_path/usr  --with-zlib-dir=$rvm_path/usr

meta-design patterns

• Separate out the things that change from those that stay the same.
• Program to an interface, not an implementation.
• Prefer composition over inheritance.
• Delegate, delegate, delegate.

big fan of Yehuda's open source contributions

Yehuda Katz is a member of the SproutCore, Ruby on Rails and jQuery Core Teams; during the daytime, he works as an architect at Strobe. Yehuda is the co-author of the best-selling "jQuery in Action", the upcoming "Rails 3 in Action", and is a contributor to "Ruby in Practice". He spends most of his time hacking on open source - his main projects, along with others, like Thor, Handlebars and Janus - or traveling the world doing evangelism work. He blogs at yehudakatz.com and can be found on Twitter as @wycats.

And I am huge fan of his open source contributions, they could be from server side or client side or any other library and I had wish to have a snap with this great contributor which I completed in RubyConf India 2011.

 

Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError + running sunspot:solr:run on windows

While running "sunspot:solr:run" on Windows ["sunspot:solr:run" works with windows otherwise use "sunspot:solr:start"] if you are receiving error like -

Exception in thread "main" java.lang.NoClassDefFoundError: 

'-Djava/util/logging/config/file=C:/DOCUME~1/pli/LOCALS~1/Temp/

logging/properties20100617-11284-furc4v-0'
Caused by: java.lang.ClassNotFoundException:

'-Djava.util.logging.config.file=C:.DOCUME~1.pli.LOCALS~1.Temp.

logging.properties20100617-11284-furc4v-0'
  at java.net.URLClassLoader$1.run(Unknown Source)
  at java.security.AccessController.doPrivileged(Native Method)
  at java.net.URLClassLoader.findClass(Unknown Source)
  at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(Unknown Source)
  at sun.misc.Launcher$AppClassLoader.loadClass(Unknown Source)
  at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClass(Unknown Source)
  at java.lang.ClassLoader.loadClassInternal(Unknown Source)
Could not find the main class: 

'-Djava.util.logging.config.file=C:/DOCUME~1/pli/LOCALS~1/Temp/

logging.properties20100617-11284-furc4v-0'.

  Program will exit.  

Please change line no. 74 in server.rb from lib of sunspot gem, 

"exec(Escape.shell_command(command))" 

with "exec(Escape.shell_command(command).gsub("'",'"'))"

For details refer source.

quickbooks integration in rails app

By the end of this post you will be able to integrate your Web Hosted Application with QuickBooks Online Edition. You will understand below points.

Objectives:
1. Establish a communications channel with QuickBooks
2. Build a set of request messages
3. Send the request messages set to QuickBooks
4. Check the status codes & data in the response message set received from QuickBooks
5. Close the communications channel with QuickBooks


The Basic Communication Model is shown in Fig. 1

                                                                       Fig. 1

Terminologies from Fig. 1
• Developer Application => Rails App
• Request => Https request generated using QBXML
• Response => Response over https in QBXML format.
• Company Owner’s Authorization => Authorization process for security purpose explained in detail in part-1. i.e. Establish a communications channel with QuickBooks
• Request Processor => Its nothing but a QBXML parser which process request from developer application and response from QuickBooks and sent in QBXML format to Developer application.
• QuickBooks => QuickBooks Account.


Now step by step:

1. Establish a communications channel with QuickBooks

Steps to establish connection between developer application and QuickBooks.
1. Obtain a test QBOE (QuickBooks Online Edition) account from IDN for testing during development. These are available to paid memberships and participants in the NFR program.

Purchase an account from QuickBooks
As the quickbooks doesn’t support Multitenant platform, so the process is defined in step-7 for connecting specific account with specific company if you have multitenant rails application.

2. Register your application with IDN (Register your app at appreg.intuit.com)

It’s an IDN Gateway Application Registration which is required to generate an Unique ID which is later used in https requests. You need to register valid https url of rails application with IDN.
URL: https://app_url
APPLICATION ID: Unique App Id generated- You will have some unique id generated eg: 169442259
Please make sure you have valid https ceritificate for the same url. Otherwise redirect it using proxies.

It also asks for some basic URLs which QuickBooks uses for further reference.

Subscribe URL: https://app_url/quickbooks/subscribe
Usually connection ticket is returned in this action when connection to QuickBooks account is created for first time with Rails App.
Change URL: https://app_url/quickbooks/change
Cancel URL: https://app_url/quickbooks/cancel
Login URL: https://app_url/login

3. Obtain a server certificate from a supported root certificate authority. This will be your https certificate.


4. Obtain a client certificate by generating a certificate signing request (CSR) and use the appreg.intuit.com site to get it signed by Intuit.
a) Obtain a client certificate by generating a certificate signing request (CSR):
i. Generate a new key:
ii. $ openssl genrsa -out idn.key 1024
iii. Generate CSR:
iv. $ openssl req -new -key idn.key -out idn-foo.csr
v. IMPORTANT: Common Name (Your Name) needs to be EXACTLY
vi. your.url(THIS MUST BE AN IP ADDRESS OF YOUR HOSTED APP SERVER):your.application.name
b) Get CSR signed at appreg.intuit.com
 Go to site, copy and paste CSR text and sign that bad boy!
c) Create PEM
 The signing process will return a certificate. Copy the certificate to a text file and name it qboe-cert.pem. Now open the key you used to generate the CSR and paste that into the same text file above the certificate.


5. Understand and follow the QBOE security requirements for hosted web applications.

Your hosted web application (Developer Application) needs a server certificate in order to receive callbacks from QBOE. Your hosted web application also needs a client certificate signed by Intuit in order to POST QBOE requests to QBOE. (You need register your application with IDN before you can generate your certificate signing request.)

6 .In your code, using SSL, implement the presentation of the client certificate to be used when posting to QBOE.
The Intuit-signed client certificate must be presented to QBOE at every POST to QBOE sites. You have to use SSL at your web server in conjunction with the client certificate. The client certificate is presented using “pem” feature of httparty gem.

require 'httparty'


class Qboe
  include HTTParty
  base_uri 'https://webapps.quickbooks.com/j/AppGateway'
  format :xml
  headers 'Content-Type' => 'application/x-qbxml'
  pem File.read("#{RAILS_ROOT}/qboe-cert.pem")
end

7. In your code, prompt your customer to grant a connection ticket authorizing your application to access the QBOE Company. Respond by sending the customer to the QBOE login page to get a connection ticket. QBOE POSTs the connection ticket back to the application subscription URL you specified when you registered your application. Handle this POST at that URL and store the connection ticket securely.

Sending the User to QBOE to Create a Connection Ticket
In your main form displayed in the user’s web browser, provide a means for the customer to start the authorization process, for example, a Subscribe button. Whatever the means, respond to the customer’s action by sending the customer to the QBOE login page at the following URL:

for production QBOE: 

https://login.quickbooks.com/j/qbn/sdkapp/confirm?appid=&serviceid=2004&appdata=

Appdata = > company id (It is not required or mandatory but preferred to use if you have multitenant application.) 

After your application gets the POST from QBOE, you need to extract the connection ticket
from the POST in subscribe action.

8. In your code, implement session ticket handling code. That is, prior to sending QBOE requests for a particular customer, get a session ticket by sending a SignonMsgsRq containing a SignonAppCertRq with that customer’s connection ticket. You’ll POST this to the QBOE data exchange URL to get the session ticket in the Signon AppCertRs response.


Eg: session.erb 
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<?qbxml version="6.0"?>
<QBXML>
   <SignonMsgsRq>
      <SignonAppCertRq>
         <ClientDateTime><%=today%></ClientDateTime>
         <ApplicationLogin><%=APPLICATION_LOGIN%></ApplicationLogin>
         <ConnectionTicket><%=CONNECTION_TICKET%></ConnectionTicket>
         <Language>English</Language>
         <AppID><%=APPLICATION_ID%></AppID>
         <AppVer>1</AppVer>
      </SignonAppCertRq>
   </SignonMsgsRq>
</QBXML>

   APPLICATION_LOGIN = 'app_url'
   CONNECTION_TICKET = 'TGT-68-wltE9aMgPpzDAC46PJwZvQ'
   APPLICATION_ID = '169442259'

  def self.get_session_ticket
      today = Time.now.strftime("%Y-%m-%d")
      xml_to_send = ERB.new(get_file_as_string("lib/quickbooks/session.erb")).result(binding)
      result = post('/', :body => xml_to_send )
      result["QBXML"]["SignonMsgsRs"]["SignonAppCertRs"]["SessionTicket"]
    end

 Response text:

{ "QBXML"=> { "SignonMsgsRs"=> { "SignonAppCertRs"=> {"ServerDateTime"=>"2010-03-17T05:29:26",  "SessionTicket"=>"V1-211-BN1A_Bt_lRGjZQRgHeVIFQ:169714916", "statusSeverity"=>"INFO", "statusCode"=>"0" } } } }

2. Build a set of request messages
Below example explains a request created to create an invoice in QuickBooks.
<?xml version="1.0"?>
<?qbxml version="6.0"?>
<QBXML>
   <SignonMsgsRq>
    <SignonTicketRq>
      <ClientDateTime><%= today %></ClientDateTime>
      <SessionTicket><%= session %></SessionTicket>
      <Language>English</Language>
      <AppID><%= APPLICATION_ID %></AppID>
      <AppVer>1</AppVer>
    </SignonTicketRq>
  </SignonMsgsRq>
  <QBXMLMsgsRq onError="continueOnError">
    <InvoiceAddRq>
      <InvoiceAdd defMacro="TxnID:1234"><!-- required -->
        <CustomerRef> <!-- required -->
          <ListID>4</ListID>
        </CustomerRef>
        <TxnDate>2010-10-10</TxnDate>
        <!-- BEGIN OR -->
        <InvoiceLineAdd > <!-- optional -->
          <ItemRef> <!-- optional -->
            <FullName >Hours</FullName> <!-- optional -->
          </ItemRef>
          <Desc >Its added from rails app.</Desc> <!-- optional -->
          <Quantity >2</Quantity> <!-- optional -->
          <!-- BEGIN OR -->
          <Rate >111</Rate> <!-- optional -->
          <Amount >101.00</Amount> <!-- optional -->
          <ServiceDate>2010-10-10</ServiceDate>
        </InvoiceLineAdd>
        <!-- OR -->
        <!-- END OR -->
      </InvoiceAdd>
    </InvoiceAddRq>
  </QBXMLMsgsRq>
</QBXML>

Following Fields of Rails App are mapped with QuickBooks Invoice using QBXML.
Rails App (Eg. Time/Expense Field Names)  QuickBooks Invoice Field Names
Contact/Matter Contact (Full Name) => Client Name/Bill To
Time Entry Date/Expense Entry  => Date Service Date
Activity Type/Expense Type => Product/Service
Description => Description
Duration (Hrs) => Qty
Rate/hr ($)  => Rate
Final Bill Amount  => Amount

Actual Mapping in QBXML for expense entry in invoice is explained below.
QBXML:
    <InvoiceAddRq>
      <InvoiceAdd defMacro="TxnID:1234">
        <CustomerRef>
          <ListID>4</ListID>
        </CustomerRef>
        <TxnDate>2010-10-10</TxnDate>
      <InvoiceLineAdd >          
          <ItemRef>
              <FullName >Fax</FullName>
          </ItemRef>
          <Desc >Fax to eric</Desc>          
     <Amount >101.00</Amount>
          <ServiceDate>2010-10-10</ServiceDate>
        </InvoiceLineAdd>
    </InvoiceAddRq>


Eg: To add a client name in QuickBooks invoice we need to send ListID in QBXML request. ListID is acquired by executing a query to QuickBooks, Contact Full Name is the parameter passed to query.
3. Send the request messages set to QuickBooks
It’s done using “post” method from http arty gem.
4. Check the status codes & data in the response message set received from QuickBooks
Usually below set of parameters values exists in every request and response which we need to consider for every request and specifically for responses.

Attributes in Request and Response Messages

5. Close the communications channel with QuickBooks
Basically it not compulsory or needed while accessing QuickBooks Online Edition from Web Hosted application.

Tools & Software: Development Environment

 QuickBooks SDK 8.0
 QBXML Version 6.0
 Ruby 1.8.6
 Rails 2.3.5
 Net Beans IDE 6.7
 Gems: Http arty 0.5.2

References
1. Intuit QuickBooks SDK Technical Overview
2. Intuit QuickBooks SDK Programmer’s Guide
3. Onscreen Reference(OSR)
4. Web site for the Intuit Developer Network (IDN): http://developer.intuit.com
5. Blog: http://jnylund.typepad.com/joels_blog/2010/02/quickbooks-online-integration-from-ruby-on-rails-the-easy-way.html
6. Blog: http://www.depixelate.com/2007/05/03/rails-and-quickbooks-online-integration-part-1/
7. http://www.servicesidekick.com/ (Quickbooks Integration)

points to remember while adding bundler to old rails apps

Points to remember while adding bundler to Rails < 3.x.x applications- When I had modified an application based rails 2.3.4 for bundler, it has taken my time to make it work as i forgot below points.
1. Please check if someone had made any changes inside plugins/gems which you have mentioned in gem file now.
2. Please note of gems if you are mentioning them :groups as they are not available to other groups. eg. Gems mentioned in :groups => :test are not available to :group => :development. Eg: if you run rake tasks which uses gem libraries in development and gems are mentioned in :tests group, it will give you errors for required gems.
3. Also make sure about gems and plugins versions which are being used in app and you mentioned Gemfile.


I hope it might save your time.

installation guides

These are links/resources i referred for respective software installations.

memcached for Windows
How to install PhyMyAdmin on Centos 5.3
Installing RMagick on Linux, *BSD, or Cygwin systems