Re: Representing XML in tables

["Peter Loveday" <peter@...>]

Whatever is used, it would be nice if it were able to be dumped to a text
file in a Lua table constructor form.  I don't think {} or metatable index
would work here (also, while I can't think of a use for real metatables on
an xml tag right now, I'm sure there'd be some application where we'd regret
that choice if we hijacked that entry).

I would be in favour of either [0] or "".  Or perhaps "." - that's illegal
as the first character in XML names, and kind of implies 'this level' in
directory semantics anyway.  Or '/' if root seems more appropriate.

Hell anything unique would do, just keep it as a string or number or
boolean, so it can be repesented as text.

Love, Light and Peace,
- Peter Loveday
Director of Development, eyeon Software


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Wim Couwenberg" <w.couwenberg@chello.nl>
To: "Lua list" <lua@bazar2.conectiva.com.br>
Sent: Friday, July 04, 2003 1:08 PM
Subject: Re: Representing XML in tables


> > These will certainly work but we would ideally want a value that can
> > be quoted as a literal;
>
> Why?  You can always write xmlRoot[xml.name], if xml.name is assigned the
> name index you want to use and it's not any different from xmlRoot[true]
> that you proposed.
>
> > the literal should be a nice, short token if
> > possible. The "{}" is certainly short, but do all empty tables have
> > the same hash value? (Possibly, but it is not obvious).
>
> Nope.  Try
>
>     print({} == {})
>
> Boolean true or false can be used.  You could also use the empty string ""
> (which is also not a valid XML name.)
>
> --
> Wim
>
>
>