ExecJS and could not find a JavaScript runtime

Question

I'm trying to use the Mongoid / Devise Rails 3.1 template (Mongoid and Devise), and I keep getting an error stating ExecJS cannot find a JavaScript runtime. Fair enough when I didn't have any installed, but I've tried installing Node.js, Mustang and the Ruby Racer, but nothing is working.

I could not find a JavaScript runtime. See sstephenson/ExecJS (GitHub) for a list of available runtimes (ExecJS::RuntimeUnavailable).

What do I need to do to get this working?

Answer 1

I had this same error but only on my staging server not my production environment. nodejs was already installed on both environments.

By typing:

which node

I found out that the node command was located in: /usr/bin/node on production but: /usr/local/bin/node in staging.

After creating a symlink on staging i.e. :

sudo ln -s /usr/local/bin/node /usr/bin/node

the application then worked in staging.

No muss no fuss.

Answer 2

In your gem file Uncomment this line.

19 # gem 'therubyracer', platforms: :ruby

And run bundle install

You are ready to work. :)

Answer 3

An alternative way is to just bundle without the gem group that contains the things you don't have.

So do:

bundle install --without assets

you don't have to modify the Gemfile at all, providing of course you are not doing asset chain stuff - which usually applies in non-development environments. Bundle will remember your '--without' setting in the .bundle/config file.

Answer 4

Ubuntu Users

I'm on Ubuntu 11.04 and had similar issues. Installing Node.js fixed it.

As of Ubuntu 13.04 x64 you only need to run:

sudo apt-get install nodejs

This will solve the problem.

---

CentOS/RedHat Users

sudo yum install nodejs

Answer 5

In your Gem file, write

gem 'execjs'
gem 'therubyracer'

and then run

bundle install

Everything works fine for me :)

Answer 6

FYI, this fixed the problem for me... it's a pathing problem: http://forums.freebsd.org/showthread.php?t=35539