Re: Meaning of the Lua logo

[roberto@... (Roberto Ierusalimschy)]

> A co-worker of mine saw both of your Lua books on my book, and he asked
> me about the meaning of the logo.  We came up with some ideas but maybe
> we should just ask you.  Is there any meaning in the design? 

The main meaning is a satellite: Lua means "moon" in Portuguese. Also,
Lua is frequently used as a configuration language, working as a kind of
a "satellite" language of the main language (typically C). At the same
time, the hole in the main circle gives some symmetry to the design,
sugesting that Lua can also be the main language (reinforced by the
name "Lua" in the circle) used together with another satellite language
(again C, in this case used to write Lua libraries).

Another meaning is of a clown's face looking up :) This is stronger in
the cover of the second edition (if you ignore the dashed line): the
main circle is his head, the hole is his eye, and the small white circle
is his nose :)  (This meaning was unintentional.)

BTW, all proportions among the various elements have nice properties.
The internal drawings in the first edition of the book show them.

-- Roberto