[Rubygems-developers] [ rubygems-Feature Requests-27318 ] weight spec.name when searching gem lib dirs for 'path'

[Aaron Patterson]

noreply at rubyforge.org wrote:
> Feature Requests item #27318, was opened at 2009-10-19 11:49
> You can respond by visiting: 
> http://rubyforge.org/tracker/?func=detail&atid=578&aid=27318&group_id=126
> 
> Category: local package management
> Group: None
> Status: Open
> Resolution: None
> Priority: 3
> Submitted By: ara howard (ahoward)
> Assigned to: Nobody (None)
> Summary: weight spec.name when searching gem lib dirs for 'path'
> 
> Initial Comment:
> gems has a *serious* issue in that someone structuring there gem like
> 
>   a_gem-1.2.3/lib/rails.rb
> 
> will have there rails.rb loaded *before* the actual rails.rb when one does a
> 
>   require 'rails'
> 
> this because the search through gem libdirs is sorted alpha/version wise with no concept of the semantics of the require statement.  in fact, we know that users of rubygems mean to require the gem *named* rails when issuing the above.  no gem user issues a normal require to pick up some random file from inside and arbitrary gem libdir.  as such it makes sense to *prefer* file matches which exactly match the spec.name when searching.  here is a patch, all tests that passed before (there was one failing) continue to pass with this patch:

I don't think this is a problem rubygems necessarily needs to solve.  As
a library writer, why are you including a lib/rails.rb in your gem?  Why
not "lib/a_gem/rails.rb"?

I wouldn't use a gem where the gem author didn't realize the
implications of included a top-level rb file that conflicted with other
gems.  It seems like bad form.

> --- lib/rubygems/gem_path_searcher.rb.org	2009-10-19 11:37:13.000000000 -0600
> +++ lib/rubygems/gem_path_searcher.rb	2009-10-19 11:46:26.000000000 -0600
> @@ -30,8 +30,11 @@
>    # Return the _gemspec_ of the gem where it was found.  If no match
>    # is found, return nil.
>    #
> -  # The gems are searched in alphabetical order, and in reverse
> -  # version order.
> +  # The gems are searched in alphabetical order, and in reverse version order.
> +  # If a path is found in more than one gem the gem with a spec.name == path
> +  # is preferred over others - in otherwords main-3.0.3/lib/main.rb would be
> +  # preferred over geonames-1.2.3/lib/main.rb if one issued a 'require "main"'
> +  # - assuming main had spec.name=='main'.
>    #
>    # For example:
>    #
> @@ -46,8 +49,18 @@
>    # only that there is a match.
>  
>    def find(path)
> -    @gemspecs.find do |spec| matching_file? spec, path end
> +    first_named = first = nil
> +    @gemspecs.select do |spec|
> +      if(matching_file?(spec, path))
> +        name = File.basename(path).sub(%r/\..*$/,'')
> +        first ||= spec
> +        first_named ||= spec if(spec.name == name)
> +      end
> +      break if(first_named and first)
>    end
> +    first_named or first
> +  end
> +
>  
>    ##
>    # Works like #find, but finds all gemspecs matching +path+.

A patch with no tests?  o_O

-- 
Aaron Patterson
http://tenderlovemaking.com/