Re: Why nobody talks about Lua

[steve donovan <steve.j.donovan@...>]

On Sun, Feb 14, 2010 at 12:29 PM, Alexander Gladysh <agladysh@gmail.com> wrote:
> But I do not think that the posts like "Why nobody talks about Lua?"
> can do much. Or do you want to attract all active language-haters and
> explain them that they are wrong?

But the comments were interesting, misconceptions and all. Here's an
attempt at transcription:

0. An 'exotic','little' language, if you measure functionality by download size.

1. Lua is mostly embedded and does its job quietly ("No one talks
about screwdrivers either") whereas PHP and Ruby are part of the
hype-driven web dev culture.

2. Lua does not come with standard batteries, and buying new batteries
can be confusing.

3. Lua does not look like C/Java, does not have a 'standard'
class-based OOP, and does not index arrays starting at zero.
(JavaScript is forgiven because of its defacto status and curly
braces.)

4. Lua has an explicit 'local' keyword, i.e. it is not Python.

5. Common dynamic languages may be pigs in the server-side performance
game, but people find it cheaper to throw processors at the problem.

However, a poster pointed out that people are increasingly interested
in the mobile space, where Pigs are a Problem!

So, 2010 should be the Year of Batteries and Mobiles....

(Sometimes, when I read these comments, I wonder if basic Google
literacy is a dying art... E.g, someone is suprised that no-one has
done a Web stack for Lua - I mean really!)

steve d.