It depends on what your needs are. You can also embed ruby( and any
language) inside a shell script. The key to understanding which tool
to use is to identify the right tool for the right job.

If I was to use say 'convert' from ImageMagick and had a legacy
"WhoTheFooCaresWhatLangIt'sIn" script I may consider calling it with
IO:popen or one of it's cousins or if it's trivial script use the gem
and build the tool in ruby.

For simple things like sifting info from the environment backticks and
env may be one way to go.

system() might be a place to call the users editor from inside the program =
i.e:
system( "#{ENV['EDITOR']} /tmp/foobar")

Hope some of this info helps.

~Stu

On Mon, Jul 18, 2011 at 5:17 PM, Tyrel R. <tyrelrichey / gmail.com> wrote:
> Am I wrong in the understanding that the ruby gems that add
> functionality to ruby do it by wrapping c programs with ruby syntax
> somehow. And if this is the case is there much of a difference between
> using a gem like RMagick and just doing a system call:
>
> =A0system 'rmagick comand'
>
> --
> Posted via http://www.ruby-forum.com/.
>
>