Re: Proposed C API function: lua_getmainthread

[Eric Scouten <scouten@...>]

We have something like this in Lightroom.

When we create the first lua_State, we push a pointer to that state  
into the state's registry table. Roughly:

	lua_pushlightuserdata( L, &some_constant );     // (see comment below)
	lua_pushlightuserdata( L, L );
	lua_settable( L, LUA_REGISTRYINDEX );

(We use the address of the function in which the above snippet  
appears as the constant. It really doesn't matter. The main thing is  
that you use the same address in the snippet below.)

Later, when we want to get back to the root state, we go back to the  
registry as follows:

	lua_pushlightuserdata( L, &some_constant );
	lua_gettable( L, LUA_REGISTRYINDEX );
	lua_State* universe = (lua_State*) luaL_checklightuserdata( L, -1 );
	lua_pop( L, 1 );

Note: Ours is actually a little more complicated, as we're storing  
some other information along with the "universe." I hand-edited this  
to remove that extra detail, and I may have bollixed it up a bit in  
so doing. Hopefully, this is close enough to be helpful.

-Eric




On 10 Mar 2006, at 14:50, Matt Campbell wrote:

> Hello:
>
> I think it would be useful to have a C API function called  
> lua_getmainthread which returns the lua_State of the given state's  
> main thread.  I can think of two uses for this function.  It allows  
> C code to determine whether two lua_State pointers belong to the  
> same global state.  More importantly, C code which needs to receive  
> a lua_State from Lua and store it long-term for use by callbacks  
> can use this function to make sure it has a lua_State that isn't  
> about to go away.  Without this measure, C functions called from a  
> short-lived coroutine get a lua_State pointer that will soon become  
> invalid.
>
> This lua_getmainthread function would be very easy to implement; it  
> only needs to return the mainthread member of the state structure.   
> I'll probably go ahead and implement it in my copy of Lua (5.1  
> final).  I'm posting this suggestion because I figure it would be  
> generally useful.  Any thoughts?
>
> --
> Matt Campbell
> Lead Programmer
> Serotek Corporation
> www.freedombox.info
> "The Accessibility Anywhere People"