Ruby dictionary for Mac OS X Feb 07

Priit Haamer · Comments: 15

After publishing the Ruby on Rails dictionary for Mac OS X, i got huge number of request to do the very same with Ruby API documentation. Fortunately, most of the work has already been done and now it's time to publish the Ruby dictionary generated from Ruby API documentation.

If you've missed the Rails dictionary, then here's the short summary why this might be good for you. Basically, you just install extra dictionary into Mac OS X Dictionary.app with Ruby documentation and get system-wide access to API docs through the operating systems dictionary service.

One of the coolest things is to have access to documentation through Spotlight. While coding, just hit ⌘ + Space and start typing the name of the function or class name that you're looking for. Notice that dictionary search for Spotlight was first introduced in Mac OS X Leopard.

Download

Download Ruby.dictionary.zip file (3.8MB, works only with 10.5 Leopard) and proceed to installation instructions. Windows and Linux versions are available here.

Installation instructions

Unzip downloaded file into ~/Library/Dictionaries folder if you want to keep this dictionary only for yourself. You may need to create this folder if you haven't installed any dictionaries before.

To make it available for all users on your computer, drop the Ruby.Dictionary folder into /Library/Dictionaries folder.

To make the searching with Spotlight work, open Dictionary.app preferences pane and drag "Ruby" from the dictionaries list from bottom to the top because only the first one in this list will be searched from Spotlight.

Donate!

I'm confident that using API documentation this way will save you a lot of time but generating and maintaining it will take a lot of mine. If you feel like donating, you can do this right here. If not, i could not be happier when you find it useful.

Feedback

Please post your feedback in the comments or contact me via e-mail or Skype. I'd love to discuss the format of dictionary pages and hear requests for additional Ruby gems that should make their way into dictionary.

Comments: 15

whalec

this is sweet man. Nice work.

Demo

Amazing. Thanks!!

onemanstartup

Very cool. Big thanks. Could you make dictionary for merb? Please :)

Priit Haamer

Let me see what i can do :) Sinatra is already on to-do list. So i'll just add merb as well.

Luke

Very cool and useful...could be possible to do an automatically converter from rails documentation? :)

kivanio

fantastic!!! Great job.

glippert

This is really nice. Now that 1.9.1 is out, I'll be looking forward to an updated Dictionary!

Jeff Hales

Priit, this is wonderful! I also LOVE the Windoze and Linux version downloads! :-))

Steve

Awesome! Is it possible to create one big dictionary so Ruby and Ruby on Rails would both be searchable from Spotlight?

Carlo Zottmann

Nicely done. Thanks for sharing!

Ryan Davis

(doh. wrong page) Priit... I've finished a version that does core + all installed gems and I've jumped through a lot of hoops to get valid data (no blank pages, etc)... I'll work with Eric to get it integrated into rdoc and released soon. thanks for your help!

iongion

I love the windows version, it is so much better and polished than the OSX one, thank you.

Mike

Thanks! And now, we need one with the Python stuff ...

Yuri Kasperovich

Thanks man! Great work!

Rizwan Reza

Thanks for this.