[Date Prev][Date Next][Thread Prev][Thread Next][Date Index][Thread Index]

Re: StrongHelp for AppLua mode



In message <0591eef458.harriet@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
          Harriet Bazley <lists@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

>Oh dear, this is even more complicated - I've just been trying to update
>my old Lua files (having completely forgotten how the language works) to
>function with the !rlua6 provided on my new hard disc image, and now
>we've got an !rlua84 to contend with....

Sorry. They do keep being developed.

>I don't *think* the RiscLua manual in !rlua84.RiscLua is the one
>intended to be used by Fred's mode, because that expects to find
>individual keyword definitions for F1 lookup, like the HTML or BASIC
>manuals.

I am not sure whether F1 lookup ever got off the to-do list for Fred's
AppLua mode.

>The StrongHelp file !rlua84.RiscLua.RiscLua seems instead to
>be a brief overview of the non-standard features on the implementation.

That is right. No point in reduplicating all the information in the Lua
Reference Manuals.

>(N.B. the website link given in that manual is
>broken: http://lua.riscos.org.uk/ doesn't work any more.)

I overlooked the "web & email" page of the StrongHelp manual which had that
broken link. I have updated it now.

The Official Lua reference manual has a complete index at
!rlua84.doc.contents.html. I am not sure how to make F1 do its work
with this.

>I found an assortment of numbered Lua manuals in the collection of
>StrongHelp manuals at
>http://www.riscos.info/downloads/stronghelp/manuals/ and tried
>downloading the highest-numbered archive, lua51320.zip, and renaming
>*that* to 'RiscLua' and putting it in !Manuals, which seems to work for
>lookup purposes - though I suspect it may be a bit out of date.
>Currently I'm still struggling with basic syntax, though, so it should
>help a bit with that.

The numbering system for Lua/RiscLua StrongHelp files went screwy a decade ago
I am afraid. When I updated RiscLua to track changes in Lua I have to confess
that updating StrongHelp files was low down in priority. I tend to use the Lua
HTML reference files anyway, if the printed manual is not to hand. I expect
there are machineries for translating them to StrongED format somewhere. To be
honest, HTML and CSS offer so many advantages over StrongHelp that I cannot see
why people stick with it. I have not discovered how to set right margins with
StrongHelp yet :(

lua51320.zip was for Lua 5.1. The current one is Lua 5.4.

Some changes in Lua:

5.1 -> 5.2 The concept of environment changed. _ENV is the current environment.
           setfenv, getfenv removed.
           The functions "module", "loadstring" are deprecated.
           Labels and goto label statement.
5.2 -> 5.3 An integer subtype for numbers. Conversion of floats to strings
           puts a ".0" suffix if the result looks like an integer.
5.3 -> 5.4 io.lines returns four arguments, no longer just one.
           Local variables can be declared readonly (<const>), or to-be-closed
           (<close>) when they go out of scope. Objects can have __close
           metamethods.

You can track all the changes at http://www.lua.org/manual/ .
--
Gavin Wraith (gavin@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx)
Home page: http://www.wra1th.plus.com/