Question

I’m trying to setup Apache/Thin to power my Rails 3.2.9 application, which means setting up both Apache and Thin as daemons. I’m using RVM/gemset that runs Ruby 1.9.3-p286, however, my daemons don’t seem to want to use it, instead, opting for some non-RVM system installed Ruby 1.8.7.

When I go to start thin, this is the error I receive:

ubuntu@ip-1-1-1-1:~/www/mydomain/mysite$ /etc/init.d/thin start
/usr/local/rvm/gems/ruby-1.9.3-p286@mysite/gems/eventmachine-1.0.0/lib/rubyeventmachine.so: [BUG] Segmentation fault
ruby 1.8.7 (2011-06-30 patchlevel 352) [x86_64-linux]

Aborted (core dumped)

Similarly, using the same command with sudo yields:

ubuntu@ip-1-1-1-1:~$ sudo /etc/init.d/thin start
[start] /etc/thin/mysite.yml ...
Starting server on 127.0.0.1:5000 ... 

# However, it refuses connections and crashes, evidenced by:
ubuntu@ip-1-1-1-1:~/www/mydomain/mysite/log$ cat thin.5000.log
>> Writing PID to tmp/pids/thin.5000.pid
>> Using rack adapter
>> Exiting!
/usr/lib/ruby/vendor_ruby/1.8/rubygems/custom_require.rb:36:in `gem_original_require': no such file to load -- bundler/setup  (LoadError)
from /usr/lib/ruby/vendor_ruby/1.8/rubygems/custom_require.rb:36:in `require'
...

I think the segmentation fault is due to the wrong version of Ruby. Clearly, it is using 1.8.7, which isn’t the Ruby I want. However, checking the ruby version otherwise seems to look OK:

ubuntu@ip-1-1-1-1:~$ which ruby
/usr/local/rvm/rubies/ruby-1.9.3-p286/bin/ruby
ubuntu@ip-1-1-1-1:~$ ruby -v
ruby 1.9.3p286 (2012-10-12 revision 37165) [x86_64-linux]

And here it is again run under sudo:

ubuntu@ip-1-1-1-1:~$ sudo which ruby
/usr/bin/ruby
ubuntu@ip-1-1-1-1:~$ sudo ruby -v
ruby 1.9.3p0 (2011-10-30 revision 33570) [x86_64-linux]

How do I get my system to use Ruby 1.9.3 when I run Thin as a daemon, and avoid these nasty errors?

EDIT:

Here’s what my /etc/init.d/thin file looks like (it’s auto-generated using thin install, I believe):

#!/bin/sh
### BEGIN INIT INFO
# Provides:          thin
# Required-Start:    $local_fs $remote_fs
# Required-Stop:     $local_fs $remote_fs
# Default-Start:     2 3 4 5
# Default-Stop:      S 0 1 6
# Short-Description: thin initscript
# Description:       thin
### END INIT INFO

# Original author: Forrest Robertson

# Do NOT "set -e"

DAEMON=/usr/local/bin/thin
SCRIPT_NAME=/etc/init.d/thin
CONFIG_PATH=/etc/thin

# Exit if the package is not installed
[ -x "$DAEMON" ] || exit 0

case "$1" in
  start)
        $DAEMON start --all $CONFIG_PATH
        ;;
  stop)
        $DAEMON stop --all $CONFIG_PATH
        ;;
  restart)
        $DAEMON restart --all $CONFIG_PATH
        ;;
  *)
        echo "Usage: $SCRIPT_NAME {start|stop|restart}" >&2
        exit 3
        ;;
esac

• Dave

Answer 1

Figured it out (or at least, I got it working one way…)

Using this suggestion on the RVM site…

1. Make sure your service (in my case, thin) is installed in one of your RVM gemsets.
2. Generate a wrapper using: rvm wrapper ruby-1.9.3@mygemset bootup thin, replacing parameters as appropriate to your installation. It will make a script /usr/local/rvm/bin/bootup_thin. This wrapper will load thin with the gemset you specified in your call.
3. Edit the /etc/init.d/thin script. Make the script call the generated Ruby wrapper by setting DAEMON=/usr/local/bin/thin to DAEMON=/usr/local/rvm/bin/bootup_thin
4. Run your daemon; it should use the correct Ruby environment now.
5. An unrelated ‘gotcha’ I ran into immediately after getting over this hurdle had to do with missing gems needed by my application. I think it has to do with different gemsets being used between my application folder and the daemon. You might have to do what I did; navigate to the application root, explicitly change to the gemset used by the daemon with rvm gemset use, then run bundle install to install the necessary gems into the gemset used by the daemon.

With that, I got my server running with Apache/Thin. For those looking to do the same, use these pages.

1st: http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/5/6/ubuntu-hardy-thin-web-server-for-ruby

2nd: http://articles.slicehost.com/2008/5/6/ubuntu-hardy-apache-rails-and-thin