How do I compile Ruby?

Under Unix, Ruby uses the autoconf system to configure the build environment. You don’t need the autoconf command on your box to build Ruby from a distribution; just use the commands:

% ./configure [configure options] % make % make test % make install

You may need superuser privileges to install Ruby if you don’t override the default installation location (/usr/local). You can get a full list of configure options using:

% ./configure --help

If you are working from the CVS archive, you may need to run autoconf before running configure.