Cannot install pg gem in Mavericks with Postgres.app

Question

I am trying to install the pg gem for use with Postgres.app on my local machine. I am running Mavericks.

Postgres.app is installed and running fine, but I cannot get the gem to work. I've done the following:

Used the command 'env ARCHFLAGS="-arch x86_64" gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/pg_config' from the Postgres.app documentation
Updated Homebrew and installed the Apple GCC 4.2
Installed the Xcode developer tools
Updated my $PATH to reference both the Postgres.app bin and lib directories

All with no success. Here is the specific error message I receive:

Building native extensions with: '--with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/pg_config'
This could take a while...
ERROR:  Error installing pg:
    ERROR: Failed to build gem native extension.

    /Users/Brian/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.0.0-p353/bin/ruby extconf.rb --with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/pg_config
Using config values from /Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/pg_config
sh: /Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/pg_config: No such file or directory
sh: /Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/pg_config: No such file or directory
checking for libpq-fe.h... no
Can't find the 'libpq-fe.h header
*** extconf.rb failed ***
Could not create Makefile due to some reason, probably lack of necessary
libraries and/or headers.  Check the mkmf.log file for more details.  You may
need configuration options.

Provided configuration options:
    --with-opt-dir
    --with-opt-include
    --without-opt-include=${opt-dir}/include
    --with-opt-lib
    --without-opt-lib=${opt-dir}/lib
    --with-make-prog
    --without-make-prog
    --srcdir=.
    --curdir
    --ruby=/Users/Brian/.rvm/rubies/ruby-2.0.0-p353/bin/ruby
    --with-pg
    --without-pg
    --with-pg-config
    --with-pg-dir
    --without-pg-dir
    --with-pg-include
    --without-pg-include=${pg-dir}/include
    --with-pg-lib
    --without-pg-lib=${pg-dir}/

I'd appreciate any help you can offer. Thanks!

possible duplicate of [Impossible to Install PG gem on my mac with Mavericks](http://stackoverflow.com/questions/19625487/impossible-to-install-pg-gem-on-my-mac-with-mavericks) — zeantsoi, Nov 26 '13 at 18:13

score 262 · Accepted Answer · edited Sep 28 '16 at 12:30

262

You probably have the wrong path for --with-pg-config, check if it's actually there.

You can find the correct path to pg_config with:

find /Applications -name pg_config

In the latest Postgres.app Version the path is:

gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/9.5/bin/pg_config

edited Sep 28 '16 at 12:30

Tobias

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answered Nov 26 '13 at 20:06

Tom De Leu

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Embarrassingly enough, that's it. After upgrading to the latest version of Postgres.app the path changed and I did not notice. Thanks! – blundin Nov 26 '13 at 20:28
This was it for me too! – Jan 15 '14 at 22:50
23

Thanks for this! For some reason, on my installation I had to run `$ gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/9.3/bin/pg_config .` – Gabriel Osorio Feb 26 '14 at 13:37
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Newer Postgres.app installs might need you to use this command ``gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/MacOS/bin/pg_config .`` – Sean May 26 '14 at 04:29
@Sean: There is no 'bin' folder under Contents/MacOS on my system. Just a postgres executable file. The one Gabriel Osorio mentioned seems to be the right path (as of 9.3.4.1). – Ege Ersoz Jun 02 '14 at 01:07
does anybody know why we need the '--' before the option? – ovatsug25 Jun 25 '14 at 15:38
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For further reference, I just downloaded Postgres.app yesterday and my pg_config is located at `Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/9.3/bin/pg_config`. One should be able to figure out where their pg_config is by using `ls` to look through the `Applications/Postgres.app/Contents` directory. See if you have `/Contents/MacOS` or `/Contents/Versions`... – peterhurford Aug 02 '14 at 18:05
every new ruby version I keep using this answer! thanks a million! – Nick Ginanto Sep 19 '14 at 19:07
The -- -- is important, must be a bug in pg. – BAR Oct 30 '14 at 15:31
@BAR: no, the "--" is used to tell "gem install" to stop processing options, and anything after that (like "--with-pg-config") are build flags for how to build the specific gem. Check http://guides.rubygems.org/command-reference/#gem-install – Tom De Leu Oct 30 '14 at 20:30
It looks like Postgres.app has been bumped up a version. I had to use gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/9.4/bin/pg_config – Tim Scollick Jul 16 '15 at 14:01
Why is the extra set of -- needed for pass in arguments to gem install pg? – Edward Jan 05 '16 at 16:19

score 16 · Answer 2 · answered Jul 22 '14 at 20:41

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In my case (running Postgres.app v9.3.4.2) it only seemed to work when prepending the environment architecture flags:

env ARCHFLAGS="-arch x86_64" gem install pg -- \
--with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/9.3/bin/pg_config

answered Jul 22 '14 at 20:41

Marius Butuc

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You can put the ARCHFLAGS in your .bash_profile (or equivalent) by including `export ARCHFLAGS="-arch x86_64"`. For me, without this, PG doesn't work. – peterhurford Aug 02 '14 at 18:06
I'm using bundler and it took me a bit to figure out how to add this to a `bundle` command. You can use `bundle config pg.build "...."`, see more at http://bundler.io/v1.3/man/bundle-config.1.html – Chad Gorshing Jan 07 '17 at 17:44

Louis Sayers · Answer 3 · 2015-07-17T23:10:54.417

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Being on a brand new mac, here's what I had to do:

Install Xcode tools from the app store
Open Xcode tools and accept the license
Now run (hopefully a future-proofed command):

version=$(ls /Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/ | tail -1) gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/$version/bin/pg_config .

If you have trouble, you can troubleshoot a bit by checking out the actual error in the mkmf.log which you can find by running (if using rvm):

cd ~/.rvm ; find . -name mkmf.log | grep pg

edited Jul 17 '15 at 23:10

answered Mar 02 '14 at 19:06

Louis Sayers

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This is the correct path for the latest version of Postgres App. – Michael Shimmins Jun 07 '14 at 02:30
The -- -- is important, must be a bug in pg. – BAR Oct 30 '14 at 15:30
"latest" work as a version now, there is a symlink. That being said, I have a new M1 ship Mac and this does not work for me, I don't know why. I inspect the path and everything is there. Maybe that's because it does not expect a dylib for libpq. – Mig Feb 10 '22 at 10:06

score 6 · Answer 4 · answered Aug 29 '14 at 05:00

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I was able to install pg with this command

    gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=/Library/PostgreSQL/9.3/bin/pg_config

I found my path by running

    sudo find / -name "pg_config"

and I Successfully installed pg-0.17.1

answered Aug 29 '14 at 05:00

ylemp

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It's easier to find the `pg_config` file with this command, so you don't have to search through all the files on your computer: `$ find /Applications/Postgres.app/ -name "pg_config"` Searching through `/Library/` would work on your machine. – Powers Jul 22 '15 at 14:33

score 3 · Answer 5 · answered Jan 14 '16 at 21:41

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adding the postgress bin dir to the path also does the trick. just add the bin to the pat like this. with recent installs the latest symbolic link makes sure that this path should be 'stable' for future version upgrades.

export PATH=$PATH:/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/latest/bin

answered Jan 14 '16 at 21:41

koen

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Thanks, prepending this to `gem install` worked fine: `PATH=$PATH:/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/latest/bin gem install pg` – Christoph Geschwind Jul 31 '16 at 10:58

score 2 · Answer 6 · answered Dec 03 '13 at 20:42

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To resolve this issue I installed postgres using homebrew using the following in the terminal window:

brew install postgres

Homebrew can be found here

http://brew.sh

answered Dec 03 '13 at 20:42

Geoff Smith

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This does solve the issue, but it means installing a whole other postgres just for that one header file. – superluminary Jul 11 '14 at 06:25
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Yeah, don't do this if you're using Postgres.app. In fact, you should run `brew uninstall postgres` if it's there. – peterhurford Aug 02 '14 at 18:17

score 1 · Answer 7 · answered Apr 08 '15 at 11:50

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This worked for me:

gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=`which pg_config`

answered Apr 08 '15 at 11:50

Gerry

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score 1 · Answer 8 · answered Nov 03 '17 at 16:23

For future reference, since a lot of us are posting new paths for the new version numbers:

Currently I'm seeing a symlink called latest in /Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/.

You should be able to just do:

$ gem install pg -- --with-pg-config=/Applications/Postgres.app/Contents/Versions/latest/bin/pg_config

And forget about the version number. This might not apply to every (older) version, but I myself was looking for a snippet I could save and reuse.

Cannot install pg gem in Mavericks with Postgres.app

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