LoadLib 5.1 problems and concerns

["Timm S. Mueller" <tmueller@...>]

Hi,

I'm having some problems and concerns with the Loadlib implementation
in Lua5.1-work5.

- On platforms without dynamic library loading capabilities, not only
the "loadlib" function gets disabled, but also "require". The mere
presence of the C loader voids the functionality of the entire Loadlib.
This is probably a bug.

- The translation of dots into path delimiters raises some serious
concerns for me. I am "requiring" lua files quite often, and not just
for hierarchically organized class libraries. I'd be happy if I'd be
able to continue using the dot for regular filenames like "util.lua".

Even though the definition for the path delimiter can be overridden,
I think that Lua should not try to abstract from an underlying
filesystem in any way -- this task should be left to specialized
third-party libraries. It seems more appropriate to me if at least
one function (preferrably "require") is guaranteed to leave the path
and filename unmodified.

- Timm