I prefer GemTools over config.gem

So I know I’m obviously biased, but I prefer to use “GemTools”:http://github.com/UnderpantsGnome/gem_tools-gem/tree/master over the gem management feature in Rails. and here’s why.

I can deploy an app to a new server instance and not even need to have rails installed. All I have to do is cap production deploy:setup && cap production deploy and my cap tasks will install the full stack, including Rails.

I can also use “GemTools”:http://github.com/UnderpantsGnome/gem_tools-gem/tree/master without Rails.

I know that I will get the version of my gems that my app expects.

I’ve seen issues with using vendored gems (hpricot I’m looking at you) where even with a frozen gem it will try and include the newest version of the gem installed locally.

Don’t get me wrong, any compiled gems are going to fail in a vendored cross platform environment if the person that vendoerd it was on a different platform.

These are just a couple of the reasons that I prefer to use gemtools install over config.gem

I’m sure I’m in the minority, but that’s ok.