Hi, Page 183 of Programming Ruby, talking about the $: load path variable, states: "You can always add additional directories to this array from within your running program". So why can''t I do this in environment.rb: $:.concat(Dir["/home/jhughes/lib/ruby/site_ruby/1.8"]) # path points at my install of rubygems and then have require ''rubygems'' work in boot.rb? Here''s the error log (just trying to get CGI working right now): [Mon May 29 14:12:32 2006] [error] [client 192.168.0.112] /projects/active/pts/public/current/public/../config/boot.rb:18:in `require'': no such file to load -- rubygems (LoadError) [Mon May 29 14:12:32 2006] [error] [client 192.168.0.112] !from /projects/active/pts/public/current/public/../config/boot.rb:18 [Mon May 29 14:12:32 2006] [error] [client 192.168.0.112] !from /projects/active/pts/public/current/public/../config/environment.rb:8 [Mon May 29 14:12:32 2006] [error] [client 192.168.0.112] !from /projects/active/pts/public/current/public/dispatch.cgi:3 [Mon May 29 14:12:32 2006] [error] [client 192.168.0.112] Premature end of script headers: dispatch.cgi I have RUBYLIB set appropriately in my bash_profile and can "require ''rubygems''" in irb, but nothing works trying to make this available to Apache. I''ve also tried adding -I to the shebang line, concatting to ADDITIONAL_LOAD_PATHS in various locations, and probably a few other things I can''t remember. Same result every time. jh -- James Hughes Web application developer Vancouver, BC "Developing a coherent political analysis is in many respects contingent upon an ability to connect one context to another, a process not dissimilar to playing the kid''s game of dot-to-dot." - Ward Churchill, from ''"A Government of Laws"?''