For the folks trying to install a RubyGem via GitHub prior to yesterday’s release, you’d get the all too familiar “Updating metadata for 563 gems…” every time.

Well no more, thanks to a massive effort by Eric Hodel. Not only are the issues with adding multiple sources fixed, but the indexing has been fixed such that gem installs are basically instantaneous now.

Do yourself a favor and run the following commands if you’re a Ruby guy/gal.

$ sudo gem update --system
$ gem sources -a http://gems.github.com

You’re now able to install gems from GitHub directly without specifying the source, just like you would if you were installing them from RubyForge.

$ sudo gem install defunkt-github

That’s all there is to it, thanks Eric!