Color escapes for terminals (Linux)

["G.H." <code933k@...>]

Hi everyone.

I have seen in a recent post a patch to print correctly[?] "\0" 
escapes in terminals. However I'd really like to use the
'official' Lua to do that. 

I am currently trying to write some scripts and it is a
_necessity_ having an easy to check output. Note that plain color
is not an option... Tried many things including string.format(),
google and lua-user-wiki without any luck. 

May I need a Lua/C module or patch to do just that?
Is there some clue in io.stdout() ?

Examples:
---------
bash>	echo -e "\033[01;31mError" -> Error (red)
perl> 	print   "\033[01;31mError" -> Error (red)
python> print   "\033[01;31mError" -> Error (red)
C: 	printf("\033[01;31mError") -> Error (red)
lua>	print   "\033[01;31mError" -> ![01;31mError

Hopefully this isn't a duplicate post. Thanks for your time.

--
Mario G.H.