title: invalid byte sequence in US-ASCII when trying to start rails app with phusion passenger
body: <p>I am trying to deploy a Rails 3 application on a Ubuntu production server using Phusion passenger and RVM. I have installed Phusion passenger successfully, but I get the following error when accessing the server on my browser :</p>
  
  <pre class="lang-none prettyprint-override"><code>Ruby (Rack) application could not be started
  
  These are the possible causes:
  
  There may be a syntax error in the application's code. Please check for such errors and fix them.
  
  A required library may not installed. Please install all libraries that this application requires.
  
  The application may not be properly configured. Please check whether all configuration files are written correctly, fix any incorrect configurations, and restart this application.
  
  A service that the application relies on (such as the database server or the Ferret search engine server) may not have been started. Please start that service.
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Further information about the error may have been written to the application's log file. Please check it in order to analyse the problem.</p>
  
  <p>Error message:
      invalid byte sequence in US-ASCII</p>
  
  <p>Exception class:
      ArgumentError</p>
  
  <p>Here is the backtrace :</p>
  
  <pre class="lang-none prettyprint-override"><code>0   /usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/specification.rb   575     in `normalize_yaml_input'
  1   /usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/specification.rb   487     in `from_yaml'
  2   /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler.rb   294     in `block in load_gemspec_uncached'
  3   /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler.rb   291     in `chdir'
  4   /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler.rb   291     in `load_gemspec_uncached'
  5   /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler.rb   282     in `load_gemspec'
  6   /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/source.rb    411     in `block in load_spec_files'
  7   /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/source.rb    410     in `each'
  8   /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/source.rb    410     in `load_spec_files'
  9   /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/source.rb    799     in `load_spec_files'
  10  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/source.rb    381     in `local_specs'
  11  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/source.rb    774     in `specs'
  12  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/lazy_specification.rb    53  in `__materialize__'
  13  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/spec_set.rb  86  in `block in materialize'
  14  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/spec_set.rb  83  in `map!'
  15  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/spec_set.rb  83  in `materialize'
  16  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/definition.rb    113     in `specs'
  17  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/definition.rb    158     in `specs_for'
  18  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/definition.rb    147     in `requested_specs'
  19  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/environment.rb   23  in `requested_specs'
  20  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/runtime.rb   11  in `setup'
  21  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler.rb   116     in `setup'
  22  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/bundler-1.2.2/lib/bundler/setup.rb     17  in `'
  23  /usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/custom_require.rb  59  in `require'
  24  /usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/custom_require.rb  59  in `rescue in require'
  25  /usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/custom_require.rb  35  in `require'
  26  /home/juniormarketing/trndclone/config/setup_load_paths.rb  14  in `'
  27  /usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/custom_require.rb  36  in `require'
  28  /usr/lib/ruby/1.9.1/rubygems/custom_require.rb  36  in `require'
  29  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/utils.rb    301     in `prepare_app_process'
  30  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/rack/application_spawner.rb     156     in `block in initialize_server'
  31  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/utils.rb    563     in `report_app_init_status'
  32  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/rack/application_spawner.rb     154     in `initialize_server'
  33  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/abstract_server.rb  204     in `start_synchronously'
  34  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/abstract_server.rb  180     in `start'
  35  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/rack/application_spawner.rb     129     in `start'
  36  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/spawn_manager.rb    253     in `block (2 levels) in spawn_rack_application'
  37  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/abstract_server_collection.rb   132     in `lookup_or_add'
  38  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/spawn_manager.rb    246     in `block in spawn_rack_application'
  39  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/abstract_server_collection.rb   82  in `block in synchronize'
  40      prelude&gt;    10:in `synchronize'
  41  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/abstract_server_collection.rb   79  in `synchronize'
  42  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/spawn_manager.rb    244     in `spawn_rack_application'
  43  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/spawn_manager.rb    137     in `spawn_application'
  44  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/spawn_manager.rb    275     in `handle_spawn_application'
  45  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/abstract_server.rb  357     in `server_main_loop'
  46  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/lib/phusion_passenger/abstract_server.rb  206     in `start_synchronously'
  47  /var/lib/gems/1.9.1/gems/passenger-3.0.18/helper-scripts/passenger-spawn-server     99  in `'
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>From what I understand, Bundler.setup() is called when starting the app and stumbles upon a non ascii character. This makes sense since the application is for a french website, but I made sure to add <code># -*- encoding : utf-8 -*-</code> on top of every source file containing non-ascii characters.</p>
  
  <p>Here is my Gemfile :</p>
  
  <pre><code># -*- encoding : utf-8 -*-
  source 'https://rubygems.org'
  
  gem 'rails', '3.2.7'
  gem "will_paginate", :git =&gt; "https://github.com/p7r/will_paginate.git", :branch =&gt; "rails3"
  gem "lorem"
  gem 'paperclip'
  gem 'rails3-jquery-autocomplete'
  gem 'spreadsheet'
  
  
  group :development, :test do
    gem 'sqlite3', '1.3.5'
    gem 'rspec-rails', '2.10.0'
    gem 'faker', '0.3.1', :require =&gt; false
  end
  
  # Gems used only for assets and not required
  # in production environments by default.
  group :assets do
    gem 'sass-rails',   '3.2.4'
    gem 'coffee-rails', '3.2.2'
    gem 'uglifier', '1.2.3'
    gem 'jquery-datatables-rails', github: 'rweng/jquery-datatables-rails'
    gem 'jquery-ui-rails'
  end
  
  gem 'jquery-rails', '2.0.2'
  
  group :test do
    gem 'capybara', '1.1.2'
      gem 'factory_girl_rails', '1.0'
    gem 'webrat'
    gem 'cucumber-rails', '1.2.1', :require =&gt; false
    gem 'database_cleaner', '0.7.0'
  end
  
  group :production do
    #gem 'pg', '0.12.2'
  end
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Any ideas as to what is going wrong ?</p>