Rhodes Installation

Installing Rhodes(Rhomobile)

These are the steps to install rhodes

Step 1 : Install Ruby: Better download window installer for Ruby 1.8.6 or 1.8.7. I am using ruby 1.8.7 and it work good for me. You can download it from http://www.ruby-lang.org/en/downloads/

Note : Don’t forget to add ruby to your path(It will ask you while installing ruby). You can test it from command prompt by typing ruby -v

Step 2: Install rubygems: Any version above 1.3.5 will work

Step 3: Install GNU : Install GNU for windows so that commands like make etc can work. You can download it from http://gnuwin32.sourceforge.net/packages/make.htm for windows. For Linux and Mac it will be already installed.

Step 4: Install JDK : Install JDK version 1.6.0_2 or higher. You can download it from http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/java/javase/downloads/index.html

Make sure you set JAVA_HOME and that JAVA_HOME/bin is on your path.

Major issues which may prompt are:

--If you get any "no such file to load -- something" messages while running the rake tasks or rhogen commands, this can usually be resolved by running '[sudo] gem install something'.

-- If your libintl3.dll is not loaded then download it by googling and put in bin folder.

Step 5 : You can install Rhodes in two ways

- Download it from git

- Download it as gem

I will prefer download it as gem. Just type on command prompt

gem install rhodes

Step 6: Install Simulator : Install the simulator of the phone for which you want to build application

1.) Blackberry : You can download the latest version of simulator from the following URL : https://www.blackberry.com/Downloads/entry.do?code=060AD92489947D410D897474079C1477

2.) Iphone: You can install it from apple website. But it will work on apple machine.

3.) Android : You can download the latest version of simulator from the following URL :

http://developer.android.com/sdk/index.html

You are ready to create your first application.

Rhodes Framework

The Rhodes is a microframework based on ruby and it is used to develop rapidly NATIV apps for Mobiles. The best thing which I like about Rhodes is that we have to develop the application once and it can be build for all major Phones. It is currently supported for Blackberry, Iphone, Android, Windows Mobile, RIM and symbians. It generates pure native apps but if we check the code it is pure html and ruby. It work with synchronized local data and take advantage of device capabilities such as GPS, PIM contacts and camera.

The Advantages of Rhodes is :

· support for ALL smartphones

· Open source

· synchronized offline data

· a Model View Controller (MVC) framework

· an Object Relational Manager (ORM) to avoid direct SQL coding

· Available as Ruby gem and also available on github for download

· Portable

· Productive

· Support and community

· Codes is similar to Rails

· Can write Unit Test cases using specs

It is product of Romobile. The major product of rhomobile are Rhodes ,RhoSync and RhoHub.

RhoSync

RhoSync is a standalone server which keeps enterprise application data current and available on users’ smartphones. The information is stored locally on a user’s device and available to him even when disconnected and offline.

RhoHub

Easy hosted development for mobile apps. It is very much similer to Heroku. RhoHub offers a hosted development environment for mobile applications. It is built on top of Rhodes and RhoSync. It allows developers to write native apps in HTML and Ruby using their web browser and then build these apps without installing device SDKs.

To know more about Rhodes watch this video :