return value of require?

[Miles Bader <miles.bader@...>]

For a while, I've tended to use require like:

   local XX = require 'whatever'
   XX.whatever()

This seems to work with almost every module I've tried it with, and
offers a nice sense of locality.

[The alternative, of course, is to assume the loaded package will
put a "whatever" entry in _G.]

However I've just realized that some things _don't_ return an
appropriate table from require.  In particular swig-generated interfaces
seem to simply return the string "whatever"!  I could swear this _used_
to work with swig-generated interface, but it's been some months since I
last did something that would test that.

So, what exactly _is_ the recommended way to do this?  Is swig being bad
by returning a string instead?  Should I change my style of using
modules?

Thanks,

-Miles

-- 
Helpmate, n. A wife, or bitter half.