Re: Lua as a scripting language in NetBSD

[Jean-Yves Migeon <jeanyves.migeon%free.fr@localhost>]

Marc Balmer wrote:
> Lua is an excellent candidate as a scripting language in base, because 
> it is small, fast, and powerful and a user can learn it very quickly.  
> For endusers, having Lua can leverage scripting in NetBSD, e.g. if a 
> reasonable interface to e.g. POSIX functionality is provided. (which 
> exists with the luaposix package, btw).  For developers of software 
> written in C it is a very convenient and efficient means to extend the 
> software by a scripting engine.

I have to use Lua for a work regarding Grub2 (Lua is used pretty much 
everywhere in this project). And I hardly see the point of putting Lua 
inside base, currently.

I perfectly understand the small and fast argument. As far as can say, 
it is; powerful, I have yet to see; at least at the present stage. The 
syntax is neat and easy (my biggest rant so far being "1" as start index 
of table, awk people will be at home with Lua). However...

It is excellent for file parsing or configuration scripts. But the 
language "environment" is pretty limited compared to more mainstream 
languages like Perl/Python/Ruby (or even Java, even if it is not 
addressing the same market). I consider the user base rather small, 
documentation and support is limited too.

I think that it has yet to prove its usefulness as an all-purpose 
language. If base includes a language that will basically need to write 
half of the bindings so that it can start being useful, people will 
ignore it (I did not make an extensive review of the possibilities; but 
as an example, a quick search for curses support in Lua is rather 
disappointing).

> Lua would allow us to extend exisiting software in interesting ways, 
> DHCP option processing in DHCP clients comes to my mind, or even the 
> system installer, sysinst (not to speak of the advantages of keeping 
> airport codes up to date using Lua scripts...) I have more ideas, but I 
> want to discuss the general case of having Lua in base first, well aware 
> that it is a chicken and egg problem:  To use Lua in base, we need it in 
> base.  To have Lua in base, we need software that makes use of it...

Is it possible to see examples or scripts of what you would like to 
achieve with Lua inside base? What software do you want to use?

--
Jean-Yves Migeon
jeanyves.migeon%free.fr@localhost