A Bash script to install Ruby on the Raspberry Pi

install_ruby_rpi.sh

#!/bin/bash

# --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
# Installs Ruby using rbenv/ruby-build on the Raspberry Pi (Raspbian)
#
# Run from the web:
#   bash <(curl -s https://gist.githubusercontent.com/blacktm/8302741/raw/install_ruby_rpi.sh)
# --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

# Set the Ruby version you want to install
RUBY_VERSION=3.3.0

# Welcome message
echo -e "
This will install Ruby using rbenv/ruby-build.

It will take about 2 hours to compile on the original Raspberry Pi,
35 minutes on the second generation, and 16 minutes on the third.\n"

# Prompt to continue
read -p "  Continue? (y/n) " ans
if [[ $ans != "y" ]]; then
  echo -e "\nQuitting...\n"
  exit
fi
echo

# Time the install process
START_TIME=$SECONDS

# Check out rbenv into ~/.rbenv
git clone https://github.com/rbenv/rbenv.git ~/.rbenv

# Add ~/.rbenv/bin to $PATH, enable shims and autocompletion
read -d '' String <<"EOF"
# rbenv
export PATH="$HOME/.rbenv/bin:$PATH"
eval "$(rbenv init -)"
EOF

# Save to ~/.bashrc
echo -e "\n${String}" >> ~/.bashrc

# Enable rbenv for current shell
eval "${String}"

# Install ruby-build as an rbenv plugin, adds `rbenv install` command
git clone https://github.com/rbenv/ruby-build.git ~/.rbenv/plugins/ruby-build

# Install dependencies
#  See: https://github.com/rbenv/ruby-build/wiki#suggested-build-environment
sudo apt update
sudo apt install -y autoconf bison build-essential libssl-dev libyaml-dev libreadline6-dev zlib1g-dev libncurses5-dev libffi-dev libgdbm6 libgdbm-dev libdb-dev

# Install Ruby, don't generate RDoc to save lots of time
CONFIGURE_OPTS="--disable-install-doc --enable-shared" rbenv install $RUBY_VERSION --verbose

# Set Ruby as the global default
rbenv global $RUBY_VERSION

# Don't install docs for gems (saves lots of time)
echo "gem: --no-document" > ~/.gemrc

# Reminder to reload the shell
echo -e "\nReload the current shell to get access to rbenv using:"
echo "  source ~/.bashrc"

# Print the time elapsed
ELAPSED_TIME=$(($SECONDS - $START_TIME))
echo -e "\nFinished in $(($ELAPSED_TIME/60/60)) hr, $(($ELAPSED_TIME/60%60)) min, and $(($ELAPSED_TIME%60)) sec\n"

Why to take all that work when you can simply do:

  cd /usr/src/
  wget http://cache.ruby-lang.org/pub/ruby/2.2/ruby-2.2.2.tar.gz
  tar -xvzf ruby-2.2.2.tar.gz
  cd ruby-2.2.2
  ./configure --enable-shared --disable-install-doc --disable-install-rdoc --disable-install-capi
  make install

Reference: https://github.com/facastagnini/raspberry-bitcoin/blob/master/bootstrap.sh

@blacktm you should really add "--enable-shared" to the configure opts.
@facastagnini what you posted doesn't install of the dependencies not rbenv

👍

thanks for this!

This is excellent, thank you. It took about 35 minutes on my rPi 2.

It didn't load rbenv for the current shell, but re-launching terminal fixed that right up.

16 minutes on RPI 3

Thanks! Just got done running on my second pi, 19min 9sec on this one, 33min on the other, this was very smooth.

Great script, thanks. One suggestion: make sure git is installed before running git commands.
sudo apt-get update && sudo apt-get install -y git-core

Other than that it worked great on my Rpi 3
Finished in 0 hr, 15 min, and 56 sec

Worked great for getting Ruby running on my Pi3

But ...

I had to come here to get rails working:

http://railsapps.github.io/installrubyonrails-ubuntu.html

"Oh no! Something has gone wrong."

My Output:

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ uname -a
Linux raspberrypi 4.4.32-v7+ #924 SMP Tue Nov 15 18:11:28 GMT 2016 armv7l GNU/Linux

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ sudo sh install_ruby_rpi.sh
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
All packages are up to date.
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
.....
0 upgraded, 0 newly installed, 0 to remove and 0 not upgraded.
install_ruby_rpi.sh: 53: install_ruby_rpi.sh: rbenv: not found
install_ruby_rpi.sh: 56: install_ruby_rpi.sh: rbenv: not found
-e
Reload the current shell to get access to rbenv using:
source ~/.bashrc
install_ruby_rpi.sh: 66: install_ruby_rpi.sh: arithmetic expression: expecting primary: " - "

Note:

pi@raspberrypi: sudo apt-get install ruby-full

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ ruby -v
ruby 2.1.5p273 (2014-11-13) [arm-linux-gnueabihf]
🤘
Source: Openshift

@Robertthcan: It's too late, but I ran into the same problem (after trying to install ruby and upgrading it to 2.4, and borking my system)

sudo apt-get install rbenv curl

I added curl just in case. The error output showed that the script could not find rbenv. I assumed it wasn't installed for some reason, so I did it.

Then Re run the script.

took 44 minutes on a RPi 3B but helped a lot!! thanks

Great gist! Thanks!
Raspberry Pi Zero W:
Finished in 1 hr, 26 min, and 24 sec

Thanks, very easy to install the latest version of Ruby onto my Raspberry Pi. Took 2 hr, 21 min, and 42 sec on an Model B+ with Raspbian Stretch.

My version of ruby is still 2.1:

pi@raspberrypi:~ $ ruby -v
ruby 2.4.2p198 (2017-09-14 revision 59899) [armv7l-linux-eabihf]

It installed successfully, without any errors. I had ruby installed earlier via apt-get. How do I get access tot he new version to work? Do I need to add some path?

Pi3, 35 minutes and 28 seconds. My setup reported version 2.1 immediately after the install, but reports 2.5.0 after a reboot. Thank you, sir!

Pi3, Raspbian Lite (Stretch), 14min/11sec. No reported errors. Nice job!

pi3b+, Raspbian, Ruby 2.4.4, 17minutes.

This gist is unreal. Amazing work, thanks a lot @blacktm

Pi3 on Jesse (I think - I'm a n00b). No errors. This just worked. Roughly 30 minutes (didn't really time it), but I wouldn't care if it took 4 hours.

I don't care how long it takes as long as it worked. I bet he took his precious time writing this wonderful script. Thank you so much for your contribution. I wish I could write a script like you.

I have the following warning messages :

• install_ruby_rpi.sh: 19: install_ruby_rpi.sh: [[: not found
• The installation stopped and it says :

Installed ruby-2.6.3 to /home/pi/.rbenv/versions/2.6.3

~
-e 
Reload the current shell to get access to rbenv using:
  source ~/.bashrc
install_ruby_rpi.sh: 66: install_ruby_rpi.sh: arithmetic expression: expecting primary: " - "`

Thanks a million @blacktm for creating this bash script. Ruby 2.6 downloaded for me in 22 minutes. No stress. :-)

Wonderful script. Thank you again for posting.

Hey @blacktm! First of all amazing work. This is a solid script. But I'm having an issue getting it to work on a Raspberry Pi 4 running Raspbian Buster 2020-2-13 version. Everything gets installed correctly, but when I try to invoke Rails s (or sidekiq or any gem) I get a massive error 1000+ lines long that ends with "You may have encountered a bug in the Ruby interpreter or extension libraries.
Bug reports are welcome."
Any ideas?

Calculate total time compilation.

total_time() {
  local T=$1
  local H=$((T/60/60%24))
  local M=$((T/60%60))
  local S=$((T%60))
  printf '\nFinished in '
  [[ $H -gt 0 ]] && printf '%d hours ' $H
  [[ $M -gt 0 ]] && printf '%d minutes ' $M
  [[ $D -gt 0 || $H -gt 0 || $M -gt 0 ]] && printf 'and '
  printf '%d seconds\n' $S
}

total_time $SECONDS

tnk u
SET RUBY VIA ARGV OR FALLBACK TO DEFAULT

Set the default Ruby version

DEFAULT_RUBY_VERSION=3.3.0

Set the Ruby version from command-line argument or fallback to default

RUBY_VERSION=${1:-$DEFAULT_RUBY_VERSION}