external/mit/lua/dist/doc/readme.html

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  31 <H1>
  32 <A HREF="http://www.lua.org/"><IMG SRC="logo.gif" ALT="Lua"></A>
  33 Welcome to Lua 5.3
  34 </H1>
  35
  36 <DIV CLASS="menubar">
  37 <A HREF="#about">about</A>
  38 &middot;
  39 <A HREF="#install">installation</A>
  40 &middot;
  41 <A HREF="#changes">changes</A>
  42 &middot;
  43 <A HREF="#license">license</A>
  44 &middot;
  45 <A HREF="contents.html">reference manual</A>
  46 </DIV>
  47
  48 <H2><A NAME="about">About Lua</A></H2>
  49 <P>
  50 Lua is a powerful, fast, lightweight, embeddable scripting language
  51 developed by a
  52 <A HREF="http://www.lua.org/authors.html">team</A>
  53 at
  54 <A HREF="http://www.puc-rio.br/">PUC-Rio</A>,
  55 the Pontifical Catholic University of Rio de Janeiro in Brazil.
  56 Lua is
  57 <A HREF="#license">free software</A>
  58 used in many products and projects around the world.
  59
  60 <P>
  61 Lua's
  62 <A HREF="http://www.lua.org/">official web site</A>
  63 provides complete information
  64 about Lua,
  65 including
  66 an
  67 <A HREF="http://www.lua.org/about.html">executive summary</A>
  68 and
  69 updated
  70 <A HREF="http://www.lua.org/docs.html">documentation</A>,
  71 especially the
  72 <A HREF="http://www.lua.org/manual/5.3/">reference manual</A>,
  73 which may differ slightly from the
  74 <A HREF="contents.html">local copy</A>
  75 distributed in this package.
  76
  77 <H2><A NAME="install">Installing Lua</A></H2>
  78 <P>
  79 Lua is distributed in
  80 <A HREF="http://www.lua.org/ftp/">source</A>
  81 form.
  82 You need to build it before using it.
  83 Building Lua should be straightforward
  84 because
  85 Lua is implemented in pure ANSI C and compiles unmodified in all known
  86 platforms that have an ANSI C compiler.
  87 Lua also compiles unmodified as C++.
  88 The instructions given below for building Lua are for Unix-like platforms.
  89 See also
  90 <A HREF="#other">instructions for other systems</A>
  91 and
  92 <A HREF="#customization">customization options</A>.
  93
  94 <P>
  95 If you don't have the time or the inclination to compile Lua yourself,
  96 get a binary from
  97 <A HREF="http://lua-users.org/wiki/LuaBinaries">LuaBinaries</A>.
  98 Try also
  99 <A HREF="http://luadist.org/">LuaDist</A>,
 100 a multi-platform distribution of Lua that includes batteries.
 101
 102 <H3>Building Lua</H3>
 103 <P>
 104 In most Unix-like platforms, simply do "<KBD>make</KBD>" with a suitable target.
 105 Here are the details.
 106
 107 <OL>
 108 <LI>
 109 Open a terminal window and move to
 110 the top-level directory, which is named <TT>lua-5.3.x</TT>.
 111 The <TT>Makefile</TT> there controls both the build process and the installation process.
 112 <P>
 113 <LI>
 114   Do "<KBD>make</KBD>" and see if your platform is listed.
 115   The platforms currently supported are:
 116 <P>
 117 <P CLASS="display">
 118    aix bsd c89 freebsd generic linux macosx mingw posix solaris
 119 </P>
 120 <P>
 121   If your platform is listed, just do "<KBD>make xxx</KBD>", where xxx
 122   is your platform name.
 123 <P>
 124   If your platform is not listed, try the closest one or posix, generic,
 125   c89, in this order.
 126 <P>
 127 <LI>
 128 The compilation takes only a few moments
 129 and produces three files in the <TT>src</TT> directory:
 130 lua (the interpreter),
 131 luac (the compiler),
 132 and liblua.a (the library).
 133 <P>
 134 <LI>
 135   To check that Lua has been built correctly, do "<KBD>make test</KBD>"
 136   after building Lua. This will run the interpreter and print its version.
 137 </OL>
 138 <P>
 139 If you're running Linux and get compilation errors,
 140 make sure you have installed the <TT>readline</TT> development package
 141 (which is probably named <TT>libreadline-dev</TT> or <TT>readline-devel</TT>).
 142 If you get link errors after that,
 143 then try "<KBD>make linux MYLIBS=-ltermcap</KBD>".
 144
 145 <H3>Installing Lua</H3>
 146 <P>
 147   Once you have built Lua, you may want to install it in an official
 148   place in your system. In this case, do "<KBD>make install</KBD>". The official
 149   place and the way to install files are defined in the <TT>Makefile</TT>. You'll
 150   probably need the right permissions to install files.
 151
 152 <P>
 153   To build and install Lua in one step, do "<KBD>make xxx install</KBD>",
 154   where xxx is your platform name.
 155
 156 <P>
 157   To install Lua locally, do "<KBD>make local</KBD>".
 158   This will create a directory <TT>install</TT> with subdirectories
 159   <TT>bin</TT>, <TT>include</TT>, <TT>lib</TT>, <TT>man</TT>, <TT>share</TT>,
 160   and install Lua as listed below.
 161
 162   To install Lua locally, but in some other directory, do
 163   "<KBD>make install INSTALL_TOP=xxx</KBD>", where xxx is your chosen directory.
 164   The installation starts in the <TT>src</TT> and <TT>doc</TT> directories,
 165   so take care if <TT>INSTALL_TOP</TT> is not an absolute path.
 166
 167 <DL CLASS="display">
 168 <DT>
 169     bin:
 170 <DD>
 171     lua luac
 172 <DT>
 173     include:
 174 <DD>
 175     lua.h luaconf.h lualib.h lauxlib.h lua.hpp
 176 <DT>
 177     lib:
 178 <DD>
 179     liblua.a
 180 <DT>
 181     man/man1:
 182 <DD>
 183     lua.1 luac.1
 184 </DL>
 185
 186 <P>
 187   These are the only directories you need for development.
 188   If you only want to run Lua programs,
 189   you only need the files in <TT>bin</TT> and <TT>man</TT>.
 190   The files in <TT>include</TT> and <TT>lib</TT> are needed for
 191   embedding Lua in C or C++ programs.
 192
 193 <H3><A NAME="customization">Customization</A></H3>
 194 <P>
 195   Three kinds of things can be customized by editing a file:
 196 <UL>
 197     <LI> Where and how to install Lua &mdash; edit <TT>Makefile</TT>.
 198     <LI> How to build Lua &mdash; edit <TT>src/Makefile</TT>.
 199     <LI> Lua features &mdash; edit <TT>src/luaconf.h</TT>.
 200 </UL>
 201
 202 <P>
 203   You don't actually need to edit the Makefiles because you may set the
 204   relevant variables in the command line when invoking make.
 205   Nevertheless, it's probably best to edit and save the Makefiles to
 206   record the changes you've made.
 207
 208 <P>
 209   On the other hand, if you need to customize some Lua features, you'll need
 210   to edit <TT>src/luaconf.h</TT> before building and installing Lua.
 211   The edited file will be the one installed, and
 212   it will be used by any Lua clients that you build, to ensure consistency.
 213   Further customization is available to experts by editing the Lua sources.
 214
 215 <H3><A NAME="other">Building Lua on other systems</A></H3>
 216 <P>
 217   If you're not using the usual Unix tools, then the instructions for
 218   building Lua depend on the compiler you use. You'll need to create
 219   projects (or whatever your compiler uses) for building the library,
 220   the interpreter, and the compiler, as follows:
 221
 222 <DL CLASS="display">
 223 <DT>
 224 library:
 225 <DD>
 226 lapi.c lcode.c lctype.c ldebug.c ldo.c ldump.c lfunc.c lgc.c llex.c
 227 lmem.c lobject.c lopcodes.c lparser.c lstate.c lstring.c ltable.c
 228 ltm.c lundump.c lvm.c lzio.c
 229 lauxlib.c lbaselib.c lbitlib.c lcorolib.c ldblib.c liolib.c
 230 lmathlib.c loslib.c lstrlib.c ltablib.c lutf8lib.c loadlib.c linit.c
 231 <DT>
 232 interpreter:
 233 <DD>
 234   library, lua.c
 235 <DT>
 236 compiler:
 237 <DD>
 238   library, luac.c
 239 </DL>
 240
 241 <P>
 242   To use Lua as a library in your own programs you'll need to know how to
 243   create and use libraries with your compiler. Moreover, to dynamically load
 244   C libraries for Lua you'll need to know how to create dynamic libraries
 245   and you'll need to make sure that the Lua API functions are accessible to
 246   those dynamic libraries &mdash; but <EM>don't</EM> link the Lua library
 247   into each dynamic library. For Unix, we recommend that the Lua library
 248   be linked statically into the host program and its symbols exported for
 249   dynamic linking; <TT>src/Makefile</TT> does this for the Lua interpreter.
 250   For Windows, we recommend that the Lua library be a DLL.
 251   In all cases, the compiler luac should be linked statically.
 252
 253 <P>
 254   As mentioned above, you may edit <TT>src/luaconf.h</TT> to customize
 255   some features before building Lua.
 256
 257 <H2><A NAME="changes">Changes since Lua 5.2</A></H2>
 258 <P>
 259 Here are the main changes introduced in Lua 5.3.
 260 The
 261 <A HREF="contents.html">reference manual</A>
 262 lists the
 263 <A HREF="manual.html#8">incompatibilities</A> that had to be introduced.
 264
 265 <H3>Main changes</H3>
 266 <UL>
 267 <LI> integers (64-bit by default)
 268 <LI> official support for 32-bit numbers
 269 <LI> bitwise operators
 270 <LI> basic utf-8 support
 271 <LI> functions for packing and unpacking values
 272
 273 </UL>
 274
 275 Here are the other changes introduced in Lua 5.3:
 276 <H3>Language</H3>
 277 <UL>
 278 <LI> userdata can have any Lua value as uservalue
 279 <LI> integer division
 280 <LI> more flexible rules for some metamethods
 281 </UL>
 282
 283 <H3>Libraries</H3>
 284 <UL>
 285 <LI> <CODE>ipairs</CODE> and the table library respect metamethods
 286 <LI> strip option in <CODE>string.dump</CODE>
 287 <LI> table library respects metamethods
 288 <LI> new function <CODE>table.move</CODE>
 289 <LI> new function <CODE>string.pack</CODE>
 290 <LI> new function <CODE>string.unpack</CODE>
 291 <LI> new function <CODE>string.packsize</CODE>
 292 </UL>
 293
 294 <H3>C API</H3>
 295 <UL>
 296 <LI> simpler API for continuation functions in C
 297 <LI> <CODE>lua_gettable</CODE> and similar functions return type of resulted value
 298 <LI> strip option in <CODE>lua_dump</CODE>
 299 <LI> new function: <CODE>lua_geti</CODE>
 300 <LI> new function: <CODE>lua_seti</CODE>
 301 <LI> new function: <CODE>lua_isyieldable</CODE>
 302 <LI> new function: <CODE>lua_numbertointeger</CODE>
 303 <LI> new function: <CODE>lua_rotate</CODE>
 304 <LI> new function: <CODE>lua_stringtonumber</CODE>
 305 </UL>
 306
 307 <H3>Lua standalone interpreter</H3>
 308 <UL>
 309 <LI> can be used as calculator; no need to prefix with '='
 310 <LI> <CODE>arg</CODE> table available to all code
 311 </UL>
 312
 313 <H2><A NAME="license">License</A></H2>
 314 <P>
 315 <A HREF="http://www.opensource.org/docs/definition.php">
 316 <IMG SRC="osi-certified-72x60.png" ALIGN="right" ALT="[osi certified]" STYLE="padding-left: 30px ;">
 317 </A>
 318 Lua is free software distributed under the terms of the
 319 <A HREF="http://www.opensource.org/licenses/mit-license.html">MIT license</A>
 320 reproduced below;
 321 it may be used for any purpose, including commercial purposes,
 322 at absolutely no cost without having to ask us.
 323
 324 The only requirement is that if you do use Lua,
 325 then you should give us credit by including the appropriate copyright notice somewhere in your product or its documentation.
 326
 327 For details, see
 328 <A HREF="http://www.lua.org/license.html">this</A>.
 329
 330 <BLOCKQUOTE STYLE="padding-bottom: 0em">
 331 Copyright &copy; 1994&ndash;2015 Lua.org, PUC-Rio.
 332
 333 <P>
 334 Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
 335 of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
 336 in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
 337 to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
 338 copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
 339 furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
 340
 341 <P>
 342 The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in
 343 all copies or substantial portions of the Software.
 344
 345 <P>
 346 THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
 347 IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
 348 FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT.  IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
 349 AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
 350 LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
 351 OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN
 352 THE SOFTWARE.
 353 </BLOCKQUOTE>
 354 <P>
 355
 356 <P CLASS="footer">
 357 Last update:
 358 Mon Jun  1 21:48:24 BRT 2015
 359 </P>
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