Ruby/DBI is a database interface in the spirit of Perl's prolific DBI authored by Tim Bunce.

Ruby/DBI differs in quite a few ways, however. It incorporates many "rubyisms" while maintaining the core DBI interface, and (currently) includes it's own suite of DBD's which are maintained with the application.

Ruby/DBI is not an ORM, like ActiveRecord or DataMapper. It is a lightweight, centralized API to database manipulation. An ORM may or may not be what you want for a given situation, due to weight, ease-of-use or other issues. Our goal with Ruby/DBI is to provide a compelling, lightweight interface that you can use for things where an ORM is too much or too cumbersome.

Getting started with Ruby/DBI is very easy if you have a working knowledge of SQL and your target database. Read the Documentation to get on your way!

The maintainers, Erik Hollensbe and Christopher Maujean, have a commitment to keeping Ruby/DBI compatible with future Ruby releases and an interest in enhancing the suite by reducing the code footprint and re-using established database interfaces in our drivers.

Ruby/DBI is a very old project as far as the ruby community is concerned, tracing back to at least 2001. There are plenty of people who have contributed to this effort. Big thanks to the original project lead, Michael Neumann, and Francis Hwang and Daniel Berger, who held the project in escrow for such a long time.