Re: After 5

["Peter Hill" <corwin@...>]

Enrico Colombini:
> I believe that Lua will be at a crossroads after release 5: the language
> authors will have to choose between freedom to perfect the language
> forever, and stability to allow Lua to reach wide usage and be used for
> large applications.

That might well happen as a side-effect of the LuaCheia project!


> Perhaps I am not the typical programmer, but I stopped studying Lua when
> the intention to release v.5 was announced; I am now waiting for the final
> v.5 release to study it from scratch, as if it were an altogether new
> language: the differences seem to me to be too subtle to be learned just
> as, well, differences.

The differences will not actually be that hard to learn... *ONCE* there is
some good crossover documentation. The current documentation addresses the
factual changes but not the subtlties and mind-shifts needed to avoid
trouble.

One rather simple example (of many) is the confusion with regard to the new
'for' operator. Because of a casual use of the word "generator" in both the
definition of the new 'for' and the definition of coroutines, a number of
people were confused into thinking there was a link. There is none... in
fact the new 'for' is just an incremental improvement on the old one.


> What I mean is: you can't build a palace on shifting sands. I have a
> couple of projects in mind (maybe I'll never be able to finish them, but
> that's another matter), but they require a rock-solid foundation.

True. As a colleague once said to me, "A *standard* can always be improved
upon... but it isn't. That's what makes it a _standard_!".

Stability in nice... but the recent changes in Lua show that it is still in
the process of maturing and has not yet reached a solid rock stage.

But that doesn't mean we should all hold our breaths and wait! There seems
to be a general philosophy with Lua to encourage the user (since Lua is an
embedded langauge) to stick with & support old versions... only upgrading to
new versions for use in new projects (or where an old project would benefit
significantly from the change).


> Yes, I could use Lua 4, but it seems a shame for new projects.

True, since Lua5 is only a month away.


> Lua is a wonderful language, even without using any of its advanced
> features. It deserves to become well-known and well-used. I think it's
> time to stop adding features (apart from transparent improvements like
> generational gc) and start building on it.

It would be nice... but I don't think it is there yet.

*cheers*
Peter Hill.