Re: Lua type names and the __type metafield

[Rena <hyperhacker@...>]

On 2012-10-07 6:52 PM, "Wesley Smith" <wesley.hoke@gmail.com> wrote:
>
> > Typical is *really* simple; on Lua values without a metatable, it just
> > calls _G.type.  If the value has a metatable, it checks for a __type
> > field in the metatable and uses that if found.  The typical library will
> > also include some more utility functions.
> >
> > Obviously this is up to library and application developers to go along
> > with, so I wanted to get the community's feedback on this.  Do you
> > folks think this is a good or bad idea?  Any questions, comments, or
> > suggestions?
>
> I think this is a very nice idea.  Even if it doesn't become a
> widespread thing, I could see it being useful from a "not having to
> reinvent the wheel" perspective.  I could see extending the library to
> include ideas from Julia about how types get annotated, relate to one
> another, and are queried:
>
> http://docs.julialang.org/en/latest/manual/types/
> http://docs.julialang.org/en/latest/stdlib/base/#types
>
> wes
>

I never really got why this isn't the standard behaviour.