title: Installing PL/Ruby for PostgreSQL 8.3
body: <p>This is to enable the development of <strong>postgres</strong> functions with embedded <strong>ruby</strong> code,
  but I have been unable to build it.</p>
  
  <p>As advised by
  <a href="http://www.robbyonrails.com/articles/2005/08/22/installing-untrusted-pl-ruby-for-postgresql" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://www.robbyonrails.com/articles/2005/08/22/installing-untrusted-pl-ruby-for-postgresql</a></p>
  
  <p>I am trying to build the needed plruby.so from the latest version (plruby-0.5.3.tar.gz) provided at   <a href="ftp://moulon.inra.fr/pub/ruby/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">ftp://moulon.inra.fr/pub/ruby/</a></p>
  
  <p>I've sorted out where my local postgres set up is and adjusted the invocation to:</p>
  
  <pre><code>ruby extconf.rb --with-pgsql-include=/usr/postgresql-8.3.4/include/server --enable-shared --disable-conversion --with-pgsql-version=83
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I've tried quite number of variations on that, but it does not seem to be able to successfully make
  the 'conftest.c' file</p>
  
  <p>It says this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>checking for catalog/pg_proc.h... yes
  *** 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.
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>And here is what I end up with in my mkmf.log </p>
  
  <pre><code>have_header: checking for catalog/pg_proc.h... -------------------- yes
  "gcc -E -I. -I/usr/lib/ruby/1.8/x86_64-linux -I. -I/usr/postgresql-8.3.4/include/server   -g -O2  -fPIC  conftest.c -o conftest.i"
  checked program was:
  /* begin */
  1: #include &lt;catalog/pg_proc.h&gt;
  /* end */
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>When I run the gcc line manually, it says there is no 'conftest.c' (and there is not, but
  it is supposed to be generated).</p>
  
  <pre><code>'uname -a' ... gives
  Linux vdev1 2.6.18.8-xen #2 SMP Thu May 8 11:52:29 PDT 2008 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux
  'ruby -v' ... gives
  ruby 1.8.6 (2008-08-11 patchlevel 287) [x86_64-linux]
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Any help and/or advice would be appreciated.</p>
  
  <p>-- Mike Berrow</p>