Modified allwords() function

["Geo Massar" <kawageo@...>]

Hi,

 

I am relatively new to Lua language.

 

As per the book written by R. Ierusalimschy, allwords() function generates words which contain only letters and numbers. I'd like to modify the function so that words can be anything printable between spaces. The mod is shown below, rather more complicated. Is there a way to simplify the code?

 

The mod would be more handy for Markov Chains Program which is shown in the later chapter.

 

Thanks.

 

Geo Massar
Independent Developer

 

function allwords ()      -- the factory
  local line = io.read()  -- current line
  local newline = true
  local pos               -- word position
  return function ()      -- iterator function
    while line do         -- repeat while there are lines
      local s, e, word
      if newline then
        line = " "..line.." "
        s,e = string.find(line, "%s+", 1)
        pos = e + 1       -- advance to the first word
        newline = false
      end
      s,e = string.find(line, "%s+", pos)
      if s then
        word = string.sub(line, pos, s-1)
        pos = e + 1       -- advance to the next word
        return word
      else 
        line = io.read()  -- word not found; try next line
        newline = true
      end
    end
    return nil            -- no more lines: end of traversal
  end
end