We will start off this tutorial with a complete, working program that will most likely make absolutely no sense to you. Don't fret, we will go through the code line by line to quickly get you acquainted with the feel of Lua.
Let's begin with a grandiose task: to define the factors of the Universe.
function get_all_factors(number)
--[[--
Gets all of the factors of a given number
@Parameter: number
The number to find the factors of
@Returns: A table of factors of the number
--]]--
local factors = {}
for possible_factor=1, math.sqrt(number), 1 do
local remainder = number%possible_factor
if remainder == 0 then
local factor, factor_pair = possible_factor, number/possible_factor
table.insert(factors, factor)
if factor ~= factor_pair then
table.insert(factors, factor_pair)
end
end
end
table.sort(factors)
return factors
end
--The Meaning of the Universe is 42. Let's find all of the factors driving the Universe.
the_universe = 42
factors_of_the_universe = get_all_factors(the_universe)
--Print out each factor
print("Count", "The Factors of Life, the Universe, and Everything")
table.foreach(factors_of_the_universe, print)
Count The Factors of Life, the Universe, and Everything
1 1
2 2
3 3
4 6
5 7
6 14
7 21
8 42
We've just successfully calculated the factors of the universe. More specifically, we've just factored the answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything. If you've ever taken a basic mathematics course in school, you should remember that factors of a number will divide wholly into the number without leaving a remainder. For example, the factors of 4 are 1, 2, and 4.
Now let's dissect the code. You may not even know where to begin, but worry not, that was never the expectation. Let's look at the first line
function get_all_factors(number) ... end
As you may recall from Algebra, a function takes in a number and outputs another. In Lua, this notion is extended in that ANY object
can be passed into a function and ANY object type can be outputted. A function is created by writing
function name.
In our case, our function is called get_all_factors. The object that is passed into a function is called a parameter.
When you create a function, you have to know what you need to pass into the function, therefore you need to explicitly state what the parameters are.
You define the parameters by enclosing them between parenthesis after the name of the function. In this case, our parameter is an object called number.
You can also create a function with zero or multiple parameters, thus the following statement is also validly Lua.
function someFunction(parameter, anotherParameter) --Valid end
We also have to close off a function with a trailing end keyword. Everything in between the first ) and the end keyword is called a chunk. The chunk consists of the actual code of the function.
We'll now look at a few statements that are not valid function declarations.
You cannot create a function with a name that has a space in it.function some Function(parameter, anotherParameter) -- Not Valid endYou cannot create a function with Function or some other form of function (Lua is case-sensitive)
Function someFunction(parameter, anotherParameter) -- Not Valid endNot using commas in the parameter list.
function someFunction(parameter anotherParameter) -- Not Valid endForgetting to close off the parameter list parenthesis set.
function someFunction(parameter, anotherParameter -- Not Valid (missing a ')') end
The following is a valid statement, however the style is not recommended.
function someFunction ( parameter , anotherParameter ) -- Valid end
--[[-- Gets all of the factors of a given number @Parameter: number The number to find the factors of @Returns: A table of factors of the number --]]--
In case that you haven't figured it out yet, -- denotes the beginning of a single line comment. Comments are not parsed, and they exist for the sole purpose of annotating the source code. For example:
print("Break me off a piece of that... Football Cream?") -- jk, it's KitKat Bar
Break me off a piece of that... Football Cream?
At the same time, we can create multilined comments by enclosing the lines within --[[ ]]. Note that bracketed comments do not extend towards the end of the line, so the following will just as well work
print("Break me off a piece of that... Football Cream?"--[[jk, it's KitKat Bar]])
There would be no point in making computers if the computer can't remember anything. Every piece of data that is stored within the computer is stored in an identifiable location. In Lua, data are stored within variables, which are identified (or named) by a single word. Below are some examples of variable declarations:
Give me a numberCanIHazANomNom = 1000Give me some text
GIMMEH = "HAI WORLD"Give me a table. A table is a list of objects enclosed between {}
BunchOfText = {"I Do Not Like Them Sam I Am", "I Do Not Like Green Eggs and Ham", "I Would Not Like Them Here or There", "I Would Not Like Them Anywhere"}
Give me a boolean
NoYouMoron = falseCopy a variable
AreWeGonnaDieIn2012 = NoYouMoronSwitching a value when creating the variable. If the first value is false or nil, then the variable switches to the second value.
Apocalypse = AreWeGonnaDieIn2012 or "2012's a joke."Don't give me anything - Note, assigning the value nil to a variable will destroy it.
Nothing = nilI can even have a function
someFunction = function(parameter, anotherParameter) endAssigning a value of a completely different type to an existing value
Nothing = GIMMEHAssigning multiple variables
A, B, C, D = "a", "b", "oops I took both c and d" -- A is "a", B is "b", C is "oops I took both c and d", and D is nil
We can also create a local variable by adding the keyword local before the variable declaration, such as
local factors = {}
A local variable can only be used within the chunk/block where it is declared. This may seem confusing at first, so consider the following example:
function GreenEggsAndHam() local Sam = "I Am Sam" end print(Sam)
nil
Since the variable Sam is declared as a local variable inside the function GreenEggsAndHam only, we can't use it in the Global Scope, or the scoping level of the running program. Seems simple now doesn't it? However, what happens if a local variable is declared with the same name as a global variable? For example
Sam = "Sam I Am" function GreenEggsAndHam() local Sam = "I Am Sam" end print(Sam)
Sam I Am
Well, it seems as if changes made to the local variable do not effect the global variable Sam. Therefore, you can think of local variables as isolated variables.
for possible_factor=1, math.sqrt(number), 1 do local remainder = number%possible_factor if remainder == 0 then local factor, factor_pair = possible_factor, number/possible_factor table.insert(factors, factor) if factor ~= factor_pair then table.insert(factors, factor_pair) end end end
This might seems a bit complicated at this time. Let's take a look at a simpler for-loop.
MAXIMUM = 10
STEP = 1
for the_number = 1, MAXIMUM, STEP do
print("The Number is now ",the_number)
end
The Number is now 1
The Number is now 2
The Number is now 3
The Number is now 4
The Number is now 5
The Number is now 6
The Number is now 7
The Number is now 8
The Number is now 9
The Number is now 10
The syntax of a counting for-loop is for variable=start, maximum (variable < maximum), increment do.
Every time that the loop executes the block of code, the variable is automatically incremented by the increment value.
Let's look at a few other examples of counting for-loops.
for the_number = 1, 5, 1 do
print("The Number is now ",the_number)
end
The Number is now 1
The Number is now 2
The Number is now 3
The Number is now 4
The Number is now 5
The incremental step size is now 2, so the script will only print the every other time.
for the_number = 1, 10, 2 do
print("The Number is now ",the_number)
end
The Number is now 1
The Number is now 3
The Number is now 5
The Number is now 7
The Number is now 9
You can also simplify the expression by omitting the increment, which is automatically assumed to be 1
for the_number = 1, 5 do
print("The Number is now ",the_number)
end
The Number is now 1
The Number is now 2
The Number is now 3
The Number is now 4
The Number is now 5
Now going back to the original example
for possible_factor=1, math.sqrt(number), 1 do ... end
Therefore, if we call get_all_factors with 9 as number (get_all_factors(9)), then we can simplify the loop down to:
for possible_factor = 1, 3, 1 do
Conditional statements are simple if switches. For example
if true then print("Hi Mom") end
The blocks within these conditional statements will only run if the if-statement DOES NOT evaluate to false or nil Below are some examples:
if true then
its_2010 = true
if its_2010 then
print("It's 2010 now")
end
if the variable exists then - This is useful to make sure that variables exist since undeclared variables evaluates to nil.
function SayHiTo(name)
if name then
print("Hello",name)
end
end
SayHiTo("Jack")
SayHiTo()
Hello Jack
if ... else ... end - We can make our previous example more useful.
function SayHiTo(name)
if name then
print("Hello",name)
else
print("Hello Stranger")
end
end
SayHiTo("Jack")
SayHiTo()
Hello Jack
Hello Stranger
not - Negates the statement
function SayHiTo(name)
if not name then
print("Hello Stranger")
else
print("Hello", name)
end
end
SayHiTo("Jack")
SayHiTo()
Hello Jack
Hello Stranger
Simple equality, checking if two values are equal
function I_want_to_find(the_number)
for a_number = 1, 100 do
if the_number == a_number then
print ("I found him!")
else
print ("Sorry, he's not here.")
end
end
end
I_want_to_find(50)
I_want_to_find(0)
I found him!
Sorry, he's not here.
inequality, checking if two values are not equal
print (3 ~= 4)
true
The Modulus operator is usually the most obscure integer operator, therefore we'll start off with it. It basically gets the remainder between the division of two numbers. For example:
print(14 % 5) -- Outputs 4
Remainder division is very useful to find multiples of a number. For example, if we want to find out if a number is even, all you have to do is to write the following
function is_it_even(some_number) return some_number%2 == 0 end
Whenever some_number/2 is a whole number, or when the remainder between some_number and 2 is 0, then the function will return true.
Let's take a look at line 12 of our example program:
local remainder = number%possible_factor
Following what we've just discussed, the variable remainder will equal zero (0) whenever the variable number is a multiple of possible_factor. Since the goal of the function is to find all factors of a number, by looping through all of the numbers between 1 and the number and checking if number is a multiple of possible_factor will in turn reveal all of the factors of the number. Indeed, the next line directly checks to see if the remainder of the two numbers is 0.
If you've ever used the Microsoft Windows Calculator, you probably have an idea of what each of these symbols represent. + stands for plus, - stands for minus, * stands for multiplication, / stands for division, and ^ stands for to the power of. These operators will only work on numbers and numbers only. Therefore, the statement
print("Hello"+2010)
is not valid and will raise an error.
Unlike most other languages, Lua do not allow string concatenation (joining two strings together) via the + operator. Instead, you will have to use .. (two periods) to concatenate two strings. For example:
print("I".."am".."Sam")
Will print out IamSam
The length operator # (hash-mark, sharp) is unique in Lua in that most other languages have length as either a builtin function or an object method. Lua on the other hand uses # as a prefix operator to determine the length of either a string or a table.
bag_of_stuff = {"do", "re", "me", "fa", "so", "la", "si"}
print("I haz "..#bag_of_stuff.." things")
Note that using the # operator on anything besides a string or a table will result in an error.
As you may have guessed, the statement me = "me" assigns the value "me" to the variable me.
The = operator however does not query whether two expressions are equal to each other (this is done through the == operator) so take care
to not confuse the two.
We will spend very little time discussing the uses of these operators as they are, at their very worst, trivial. If you still find yourself having trouble with these operators, then I would suggest that you take a look at http://lua.lickert.net/operators/index_en.html
We now have most of the required materials that are needed to fully interpret the example code. There are only three functions that we have not discussed yet, and I will briefly discuss them right now.
Now we're ready to delve back into the example. Let's start back at the for loop. Whenever we attempt to disect a loop, we should always consider single iterations, that is, what the Lua interpreter executes within a single step in the for loop. In this case, we will let number equal 10 and possible_factor equal 2
local remainder = number%possible_factor if remainder == 0 then local factor, factor_pair = possible_factor, number/possible_factor table.insert(factors, factor) if factor ~= factor_pair then table.insert(factors, factor_pair) end end
12 The variable remainder equals 10%2 or 0, as 2 divides wholly into 10.
14 Since remainder does equal 0, we will be able to execute lines 15 through 20.
15 We declare factor to equal to possible_factor, or 2, and factor_pair to equal to number/possible_factor, or 10/2 = 5. Think about it, if 2 is a factor of 10, and 2*5 equals 10, then would that also mean 5 is a factor of 10 as well?
16 Insert 2 into the table factors.
18 Because the square root of a number is also its factor, there are certain cases when factor and factor_pair are the same number. In these cases, we want to avoid inserting the same number into the table twice.
possible_factor is now 3, start over at line 12 again
If we are to continue this loop, then we would have to follow the following logic:
12 remainder equals 10%3, or 1 (10-3*3=1)
14 Our remainder is not 0, therefore we skip lines 15 through 20.
possible_factor is now 4, which is larger than math.sqrt(10), so we leave the for-loop
And by the time that possible_factor reaches 4, we have already scanned through all of the possible factors of the number 10. Therefore, we now have stored all of the factors of the number. However, before we hand those factors over, we want to sort them in ascending order.
table.sort(factors)
After which we can finally hand over, or return, the value back and exit the function.
return factors
The rest of the code concerns with printing out the results of the table. You will need to be acquainted with the table.foreach(table, func) function which does nothing more than go through a table and calling the function in the second parameter field func, in this case print, with the element of the tables as the parameter.
--The Meaning of the Universe is 42. Let's find all of the factors driving the Universe.
the_universe = 42
factors_of_the_universe = get_all_factors(the_universe)
--Print out each factor
print("Count", "The Factors of Life, the Universe, and Everything")
table.foreach(factors_of_the_universe, print)
In which case we will find the following output:
Count The Factors of Life, the Universe, and Everything
1 1
2 2
3 3
4 6
5 7
6 14
7 21
8 42
That's it for our crash course, the crash course was meant to be a guide to get you quickly acquainted with the language style of Lua. It will do nothing more or less that just that. I will see you in a future chapter of this tutorial.
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