Rails and PostgreSQL on Snow Leopard using homebrew

29 Apr 2010 – Laurel, MD

Update: 12 May 2010. Updated automatic load instructions.

As we have seen in the past, I couldn’t find a definitive, accurate install and use guide for PostgreSQL with Rails on Snow Leopard, using homebrew. In the end, it took less work than any of the existing instruction lists (that I found) indicated.

Of Note: I did NOT need to make any changes to my $PATH or .profile.

Most of this is based on info from:

http://blog.tquadrado.com/?p=215
test
http://www.gregbenedict.com/2009/08/31/installing-postgresql-on-snow-leopard-10-6/

Thank you all for the helpful info.

Installation

We assume you have homebrew installed.
Note: I did not allow incoming network connections. You may, but everything I discuss works without it.

$ brew install postgresql #postgres is alias

Follow the instructions for initializing (initdb…).
Follow the instructions for automatic load, if applicable (launchctl…)

That’s it. I didn’t need any of the mkdir and chown commands some instructions listed.

Install the fast postgres gem:
$ gem install pg

Installation complete.

UPDATE:
If postgres is not loading on boot OR you see:
launchctl: Dubious ownership on file (skipping): /usr/local/Cellar/postgresql/8.4.3/org.postgresql.postgres.plist nothing found to load

Then this should fix it:
sudo chown root:wheel /usr/local/Cellar/postgresql/8.4.3/org.postgresql.postgres.plist sudo launchctl load -w /usr/local/Cellar/postgresql/8.4.3/org.postgresql.postgres.plist

Rails

The docs indicate that a superuser named ‘postgres’ is created by default.
Instead, my installation created a superuser named after the logged in user: $USER.

To make sharing the database.yml easier, I created another user:
$ createuser --superuser your_company_name -U $USER

Now update your database.yml:

development:
  adapter: postgresql
  database: health_crowd_dev
  username: your_company_name
  host: localhost

Some instructions list more settings. These worked for me.

You are ready.
$ rake db:create

fini.

Rails and PostgreSQL on Snow Leopard using homebrew

Installation

Rails

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