Problems with jslint-v8 Ruby gem installation on Windows7 64-bit

Question

There is a problem during Rally App SDK 2.0p environment setup on Windows 7 (64-bit). I have installed Ruby 1.8.7-p358 from rubyinstaller.org and managed to install rake Ruby gem. But I have problems installing jslint-v8 gem. It has dependencies on therubyracer and libv8 gems which need to be built using Ruby DevKit. During the installation I got the following error:

C:\ruby> gem install jslint-v8
Temporarily enhancing PATH to include DevKit...
Building native extensions.  This could take a while...
ERROR:  Error installing jslint-v8:
    ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension.

    C:/ruby/bin/ruby.exe extconf.rb
*** 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=C:/ruby/bin/ruby
extconf.rb:13: uninitialized constant Gem (NameError)
Checking for Python...

Gem files will remain installed in C:/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/libv8-3.3.10.4 for inspection.
Results logged to C:/ruby/lib/ruby/gems/1.8/gems/libv8-3.3.10.4/ext/libv8/gem_make.out

Does anyone know how to install it correctly in Win7? Thank you!

Answer 1

The gem you try to install depends on libv8 gem, which is nothing more than a wrapper for Google V8 JavaScript VM.

There is no pre-compiled libv8 for Windows (like there is for Linux or OSX), this means it needs to build V8 from scratch.

The code around the build process of V8 is not very portable, not to mention that to compile libv8 you need Python installed :-P

Until today nobody was able to follow the instructions for libv8 pre-compilation on Windows, following the repository instructions:

https://github.com/cowboyd/libv8

Sorry not been able to provide you a better response.

Answer 2

Try this gem install libv8 -v '3.16.14.3' -- --with-system-v8

Reference: Error installing libv8: ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension

Answer 3

For building gem native extensions in Windows when you install a gem, you usually need the DevKit installed too: http://rubyinstaller.org/downloads/ - go to the devkit download link
Their github page has instructions for installing it: https://github.com/oneclick/rubyinstaller/wiki/Development-Kit

I would also recommend using Ruby 1.9.3 instead of 1.8.7, but that shouldn't be much of an issue

Hope that helps.