Gemfile.lock, Bundler and Deploying with Capistrano - ruby-on-rails

Question

I am trying to deploy and I do not want the Gemfile.lock in version control. But when it's removed I get the following error.
* executing "cd /var/www/vhosts/my-site/releases/20120628162217 && bundle install -- gemfile /var/www/vhosts/mysite/releases/20120628162217/Gemfile --path /var/www/vhosts/my-site/shared/bundle --deployment --quiet --without development test cucumber analytics"
servers: ["staging-beta.my-site.com"]
[staging-beta.my-sitehealth.com] executing command
** [out :: staging-beta.my-site.com] The --deployment flag requires a Gemfile.lock. Please make sure you have checked your Gemfile.lock into version control before deploying.
command finished in 332ms
Here is my deploy.rb file:
require 'thinking_sphinx/deploy/capistrano'
set :rvm_ruby_string, '1.9.3'
# Ignore the .git directory when creating a release
set :copy_exclude, ".git*"
set :stages, %w(production staging rails_ec2_west_staging vagrant analytics highgroove ec2_highgroove stage_analytics ec2_staging highgroove_staging ec2_chef ec2_sphinx_chef solr_staging ec2_sphinx_prod_chef)
set :default_stage, "staging"
set :bundle_without, [:development, :test, :cucumber, :analytics]
require 'bundler/capistrano'
set :custom_symlinks, {}
require 'capistrano/ext/multistage'
if ARGV.first == 'ec2_staging'
require 'rvm/capistrano'
# for dual deploys on ec2 staging
set :application, "my-site3"
else
set :application, "my-site"
end
set :use_sudo, false
set :user, "www-data"
set :group, "www-data"
ssh_options[:forward_agent] = true
set :branch, $1 if `git branch` =~ /\* (\S+)\s/m
set :scm, :git
set :repository, "git#github.com:my-company/my-site3.git"
set :deploy_to, "/var/www/vhosts/#{application}"
set :deploy_via, :remote_cache
set :deploy_env, 'production'
# If you are using Passenger mod_rails uncomment this:
# if you're still using the script/reapear helper you will need
# these http://github.com/rails/irs_process_scripts
namespace :deploy do
task :start do ; end
task :stop do ; end
task :restart, :roles => :app, :except => { :no_release => true } do
run "#{try_sudo} touch #{File.join(current_path,'tmp','restart.txt')}"
end
task :seed, :roles => :db do
rake = fetch(:rake, "rake")
rails_env = fetch(:rails_env, "production")
run "cd #{current_path} && #{rake} RAILS_ENV=#{rails_env} db:seed"
end
end
namespace :assets do
task :precompile do
run "cd #{current_path} && #{rake} RAILS_ENV=#{rails_env} my-site-web:assets:precompile"
end
end
task :uname do
run "uname -a"
end
after "deploy:update", "deploy:cleanup"
after "deploy:update", "assets:precompile"
require './config/boot'
#require 'airbrake/capistrano'

Answer 1

It's the best practice to include the gemfile.lock. From Bundlers rational page: http://gembundler.com/rationale.html
This is important: the Gemfile.lock makes your application a single package of both your own code and the third-party code it ran the last time you know for sure that everything worked. Specifying exact versions of the third-party code you depend on in your Gemfile would not provide the same guarantee, because gems usually declare a range of versions for their dependencies.