Lua modules and packaging - splitting big stuff into smaller pieces

[Marius Kjeldahl <marius@...>]

Although not an experienced Lua hacker by any counts, I've read throught the 
Wiki, the discussions on this list and followed the release of 
luasocket-2.0-beta. I have a small toy-project which ran fine with 
luasocket-2.0-alpha, but after the release of the beta I am trying to updated 
it both to work with the latest release AND to learn about the proper way of 
packaging modules "lua-style".

I've written more about what I have done to get it up and running at the end 
of this email, but my real question is:

* What is the general advice on how to package your own lua source code 
modules?

I tried doing it the "luasocket" style way, by starting my module 
(ModuleName.lua) with:

local ModuleName = {}
_LOADED["ModuleName"] = ModuleName

function ModuleName.test ()
  print ("Hello world!")
end

however, if I try from my "main" lua program the following:

require ("lua.lua") -- Use modified require defintion from luasocket

local mymod = require ("ModuleName")
print (mymod)
mymod.test ()

I get the following:

table: 0x807bec0
lua: Main.lua:29: attempt to call field `test' (a nil value)
stack traceback:
        Main.lua:29: in function `Main'
        <command line>:1: in main chunk
        [C]: ?

The print line shows that mymod is a valid table, but still the "test" 
function is a nil value, and I am not sure why.

If somebody have any pointers to where I can get the advice on how to do this, 
please let me know. Yes, I have ordered the book...

And finally, does anybody have a nice "Dumper" function ready, similar to 
perl's Data::Dumper module? That would probably help me figuring out what is 
hidden behind all these tables and be nice for debugging.

Regards,

Marius K.

COMMENTS ABOUT WHAT I HAVE DONE BELOW:

I'm pretty sure I've gotten luasocket-2.0-beta up and running fine. The 
"advice" on the luasocket documentation pages basically said stuff everything 
into one directory and it should work. While this might be a good initial 
advice, it gives me little to no clue on how I am supposed to be doing it 
"the proper way". With some trial and error, I managed to get luasocket 
running from it's own directory, and with my own code in it's own place. If 
others wonder, this is basically what I had to do:

In the "main" lua executable, I start with:

LUA_PATH = "/usr/local/lua/luasocket/?;/usr/local/lua/luasocket/?.lua;?;?.lua"
LUA_PATHLIB = "/usr/local/lua/luasocket/libluasocket.so"
require ("lua.lua")

This bascially tells lua to add /usr/local/lua/luasocket to the list of 
directories to look for lua modules (at least when using the modified require 
function that comes with lua.lua). Furthermore, it says exactly what 
(including location) luasocket shared library I want to use.