Re: First post of 2008? (Look! Brand new subject! Reassuringly off-topic!)

Measuring time is something very different from trying to parameterize 
is on the surface of a sphere(or actually a cylinder) :)
Or, for that matter, labeling time as an offset since the death of a 
character 2008 years ago in a book...

Shane Lee wrote:
> My vote is that the list follows the Coordinated Universal Time (UTC,
> or Zulu) standard that has been adopted worldwide. Most Operating
> Systems today offset UTC by a known amount depending on current
> location. It is the most universally adopted time measurement and is
> good enough for atomic clocks, so it's good enough for me :-D
>
> -Shane
>
>   

Re: First message of 2008?

>> Date: Tue, 1 Jan 2008 00:00:02 +1100 (AEDT)
>
> Now you can tell us how is the future :)

Well, from where I'm sitting the future is looking very foggy. I think the Dutch went a bit wild with their
fireworks... [phew!] But I'm sure it's going to clear up later today.

> Happy new year to all!

All the best for 2008 to Lua folks everywhere!

Ashwin.
--

-- 
no signature is a signature.

Re: Why does numeric for loop not accept an explist?

>However, numeric for loops are restricted to an explicit argument
>list, so the first example won't compile:
>
>function indicies(t) return 1, #t end
>for key = indicies(t) do
>  print(key, t[key])
>end

[snip]

>The complete syntax does not give the reason for this, so what
>is the rationale behind this decision?

AFAICS, the numeric for is simply a syntactical convenience which allows 
loops like this:

   i=1 repeat ... i = 1+3 until i>10

to be more cleanly coded as:

   for i=1,10,3 do ... end

The generic for is quite different, syntactically and semantically. The 
'=' changes to 'in' and the 'start,stop,step' list of (two or three) 
numbers becomes an 'iterator,invariant,controlvar' list.

The similarity in syntax is convenient, familiar (other languages overload 
'for' in an analogous way), and avoids the need for an additional keyword. 
Despite the overloading of "for", the two sorts of looping constructs are 

Re: Why does numeric for loop not accept an explist?

On Dec 31, 2007 9:37 PM, Duck <duck <at> roaming.ath.cx> wrote:
>    i=1 repeat ... i = 1+3 until i>10

Sure looks like an endless loop to me 

 - Jeff

Lua Lanes...alive or dead?

Whenever multithreading in Lua comes up, three possibilities are usually 
mentioned:

1. LuaThread, which is now out-of-date, requires a (very 
slightly) non-standard Lua core, and requires the programmer to take care 
of synchronisation issues.

2. LuaTask, recently bumped up to 1.6.4, and pretty fully documented, yet 
dismissed by some as "dead" or at least "inactive".

3. Lua Lanes, which is sometimes described as "active" and promoted as 
the way to go.

However, Lua Lanes was last updated in May 2007, is still described as 
"beta," has (IMO) incomplete and thus very-hard-to-use documentation, and 
has had a broken home page for quite some time (IIRC, it used to give 
404s; now it's giving 401s).

Is the project still going?

I'm a happy LuaTask user myself, but thought I'd better look at the 
competition (for want of a better word), only to find it seems to be 
stuck/dead/busted.

PS: The now-official and documented ability of LuaTask's to consume a 
chunk rather than just the name of an external file when creating a task 
is very handy. Thanks, DanielQ.

PPS: Diego, will there ever be an "official" LuaThread for 5.1.2 (with or 

Re: Why does numeric for loop not accept an explist?

>> i=1 repeat ... i = 1+3 until i>10

> Sure looks like an endless loop to me

Errr, i = i+3, of course.

Another of the avdantages of the "for equals" loop -- the loop conditions 
are easier to get right, or perhaps slightly harder to get wrong 

Re: First message of 2008?

I was following this thread from my inbox even though I didn't 
participate... So, who made the first post?

Anyway; feliz ano novo 2008 to everyone across the globe! =)

Re: First message of 2008?

Re: Lua Lanes...alive or dead?

Lua Lanes is not dead.

The lack of updates has been due to my business, dealing with an  
upcoming Lua project. Once that is out, I can look more into the  
existing ones. There are some wishes I've received for Lua Lanes, but  
no patches or other such contributions. They are welcome. Also one  
reason to maintain the "beta" status is that I don't know of much use  
of Lanes, actually.

That can be either good or bad. It either means the module's serving  
its current users well, or it means there are not enough current users.

Anyway. Personally I think we could benefit of a "round table"  
discussion to decrease the number of multithreading solutions, and  
focus people's efforts on one. Naturally, I wouldn't be seeing Lanes  
as one of those stepping aside. :)  This is why I made the comparison  
to other solutions, which unfortunately lacks LuaTask, as has been  
pointed out. I do welcome someone to contribute a Lua Lanes vs.  
LuaTask comparison.

Open source does not mean the author should do it all by himself. Lua  
Lanes is not Lua. Patches are welcome, and also write access to the  
main subversion repository can be granted for persons who've proven  
to be worth it.

Happy new year,    ;)

-asko

This is a list of my dead and alive projects, in order of personal  
priority:

	luaSuper	to be born, rechristened as 'luaSub' (new)
	Lumikki		Lua web page generator. Alive but quiet.  Needs a revise.
	Lua Lanes	Alive but quiet.
	Hamster		build system using Lua.   Alive but in hibernation (as  
hamsters do)
	LNUM patch	Alive and up to date.
	Token reader patch	Alive and up to date.

	Andes development IDE	not started
	Spider virtual PDA		not started
	LuaX		dead, not supported

Duck kirjoitti 1.1.2008 kello 5:57:

>
> Whenever multithreading in Lua comes up, three possibilities are  
> usually mentioned:
>
> 1. LuaThread, which is now out-of-date, requires a (very slightly)  
> non-standard Lua core, and requires the programmer to take care of  
> synchronisation issues.
>
> 2. LuaTask, recently bumped up to 1.6.4, and pretty fully  
> documented, yet dismissed by some as "dead" or at least "inactive".
>
> 3. Lua Lanes, which is sometimes described as "active" and promoted  
> as the way to go.
>
> However, Lua Lanes was last updated in May 2007, is still described  
> as "beta," has (IMO) incomplete and thus very-hard-to-use  
> documentation, and has had a broken home page for quite some time  
> (IIRC, it used to give 404s; now it's giving 401s).
>
> Is the project still going?
>
> I'm a happy LuaTask user myself, but thought I'd better look at the  
> competition (for want of a better word), only to find it seems to  
> be stuck/dead/busted.
>
> PS: The now-official and documented ability of LuaTask's to consume  
> a chunk rather than just the name of an external file when creating  
> a task is very handy. Thanks, DanielQ.
>
> PPS: Diego, will there ever be an "official" LuaThread for 5.1.2  
> (with or without the tag "alpha"  ?
>
>

Re: First post of 2008? (Look! Brand new subject! Reassuringly off-topic!)

> Or, for that matter, labeling time as an offset since the death of a
> character 2008 years ago in a book...
>

FYI: Anno Domini (or AD) actually attempts to calculate the "birth" of
Christ, which consequentially was not recorded in "a book" but rather
four separate books with four separate authors.

This is waaay off-topic so I will post no further on this issue,
however it appeared to be an attack on my religious beliefs made in
ignorance which I cannot in good faith stand idly by and swallow. If
you wish to make semi-religious postings, might I suggest you take it
off-list and direct them to me, since I am more than willing to back
up any of my statements with historical records instead of knee-jerk
reactions to the Discovery Channel.

-Shane