Build up Ruby on Rails

This quick-start guide demonstrates how to use Blink Build to set up and start a Ruby on Rails project to work on from your iPad or iPhone. Lets start by connecting to our Build machie:

blink> build mosh

The Hacker Tools container started by Blink Build has Ruby and tools like Bundler out of the box. To install Rails, we are going to configure the default location for Gems in our Cloud Disk, so it is saved when our machine is automatically shutdown. To do so, edit .bashrc:

# Set installation directory in $HOME
export GEM_HOME=$HOME/.local/gems
# Add Gem binaries to path
PATH="$HOME/.local/gems/bin:$PATH"

We are now ready to install Rails:

gem install rails

Now let’s create a new Rails project:

rails new hello

Go to hello folder:

cd hello

And run:

rails server -b 0.0.0.0

We use host 0.0.0.0 so the server is exposed to the Build container, but not to the outside world.

Opening Ports

Blink Build can transparently expose the ports on the remote container inside your local device. In this case, we want to access the Rails server running on port 3000, in our localhost on port 3001:

build ports add htools 3000 3001

Now you can access your project from http://localhost:3001!

👍 Blink Build exposes ports securely over a Wireguard interface.

Dependencies

Hacker Tools comes with bundler out of the box, so to add dependencies to your project, edit your Gemfile as you need them:

gem 'nokogiri'
gem 'geokit'

After adding a dependency, if it is not yet installed, install it:

bundle install

Comments

That’s it! You just created a very basic ”Hello, World!” application using Ruby on Rails and Blink Build. Using Build for Ruby is no different than any machine, so you can use online tutorials and feel comfortable doing so, even if you're just starting out.

To learn more or to join others and improve Ruby development on iOS, join us in our Discussion.