Ferret talk - Dec 2005 - Some newbie questions

Hi all,

I''m newly discovering Ferret, and just did a crash course on Lucene to 
(I get the concepts behind it). But I''m have a few doubts:

1. What is the ''recommended'' way of integrating Ferret into my
app now?
The gem version or the plugin?

2. Where do I checkout the plugin from? Do I just copy the version on 
the wiki?

Those apart, Ferret is really lacking a simple guide. The wiki page 
"HowToIntegrateFerretWithRails" is sometimes not very clear. I would 
love to clean it up or create a separate page for ferret on the wiki, if 
you guys help me out figuring Ferret. It will be very useful to me and 
others.

The plugin version looks much simpler. Where do I start?

Thanks much,
Vamsee.

Hi, Vamsee,

some answers inline...

Vamsee Kanakala wrote:
>Hi all,
>
>I''m newly discovering Ferret, and just did a crash course on Lucene
to
>(I get the concepts behind it). But I''m have a few doubts:
>
>1. What is the ''recommended'' way of integrating Ferret
into my app now?
>The gem version or the plugin?
>  
>
It''s not a question of ''OR''. You''ll
definitly need the ferret gem,
because this is providing the ferret functionality to build and query 
indexes (and so on). The plugin just tries to offer a convenient way to 
integrate the functionality provided by the gem. So the first step __has 
to be__: gem install ferret
>2. Where do I checkout the plugin from? Do I just copy the version on 
>the wiki?
>  
>
As you have realized integration questions are not very advanced yet. 
I''m not aware of a repository that provides a svn checkout of a plugin.
Maybe these are in the works but if you''ve got the resources and get
the
experience while you are going on i''m pretty sure that the rails crowd 
would love a "best way of ferret-integration" plugin.
>Those apart, Ferret is really lacking a simple guide. The wiki page 
>"HowToIntegrateFerretWithRails" is sometimes not very clear. 
>
Indeed. This was my first approach with rails and ferret and it 
definitly needs a clean up. I think the Rails wiki would be a great 
place for putting together the different integration efforts that you 
might find on the ferret wiki, the rails mailing list, this list and the 
rails wiki.
>I would 
>love to clean it up or create a separate page for ferret on the wiki, if 
>you guys help me out figuring Ferret. It will be very useful to me and 
>others.
>  
>
Regarding your offer of help: GREAT. I would suggest you try to put 
things together for your app and share with us if you''ve got something.
I think its great that Dave is putting his power into advancing ferret 
performance-wise. Ferret is a ruby gem and should work not only with 
rails. So its just fair that we (the rails community) commit a best 
practice of integration - that shouldn''t be too ''heavy
lifting''

Regards
Jan
>The plugin version looks much simpler. Where do I start?
>
>Thanks much,
>Vamsee.
>
>_______________________________________________
>Ferret-talk mailing list
>Ferret-talk at rubyforge.org
>http://rubyforge.org/mailman/listinfo/ferret-talk
>
>  
>

Jan Prill wrote:
>As you have realized integration questions are not very advanced yet. 
>I''m not aware of a repository that provides a svn checkout of a
plugin.
>Maybe these are in the works but if you''ve got the resources and
get the
>experience while you are going on i''m pretty sure that the rails
crowd
>would love a "best way of ferret-integration" plugin.
>  
>
If you are planning on using the acts_as_ferret plugin, it''s still very
much a work in progress. However, if you decide to take the plunge, be 
sure to notice that there are actually two versions available on the 
wiki. I added some functionality to the initial implementation and have 
listed my version lower down on the page. It still needs a lot of 
testing and may contain some serious bugs.

As for a repository, that''s been something I''ve been thinking
about
recently and would like to set up soon, but I don''t currently have a 
good hosting solution for it. As soon as I can figure that aspect out 
and make sure that Kasper Weibel (who developed the original version) is 
not opposed, I will be setting one up.
>Indeed. This was my first approach with rails and ferret and it 
>definitly needs a clean up. I think the Rails wiki would be a great 
>place for putting together the different integration efforts that you 
>might find on the ferret wiki, the rails mailing list, this list and the 
>rails wiki.
>  
>
I think a few alternatives have popped up since that wiki page was put 
together. I think collecting these approaches in one place would be an 
excellent idea.

Regards,
Thomas Lockney