LUA_COMPAT_VARARG incompatibility

[David Manura <dm.lua@...>]

There is a small class of functions that are valid according to the
Lua 5.1 Reference Manual but will not run successfully when
LUA_COMPAT_VARARG is enabled.  This includes the stock version of Lua
5.1.3 and current Lua Binaries, which enable LUA_COMPAT_VARARG by
default.

  -- valid Lua 5.1 but fails with LUA_COMPAT_VARARG
  do local arg=1; (function(...) assert(arg == 1, ...) end)() end

The behavior of LUA_COMPAT_VARARG is implementation defined, but what
happens in lparser.c is that for a vararg function, the local variable
"arg" is always created (i.e. VARARG_HASARG set), and a table is
initially scheduled to be created in that variable
(i.e. VARARG_NEEDSARG set).  Only if "..." is referenced inside the
function is VARARG_NEEDSARG then cleared.

So, it seems odd that the default behavior of 5.1 is to provide
compatibility with 5.0 while breaking compatibility with itself
(albeit in a small way).

Perhaps a better behavior is to make VARARG_HASARG <=>
VARARG_NEEDSARG.  Create neither the arg variable nor the arg value
unless there is no reference to "..."  in the body.  After all, it is
odd and "probably" a typo to place "..." in a parameter list but not
in a function body...unless e.g. if you're running 5.0 code.

  function(...) print(1) end            -- valid in 5.0 and 5.1
                                        --   but probably an error
  function(...) print(arg[1]) end       -- valid in 5.0 and 5.1
                                        --   but likely 5.0 intended
  function(...) print(...) end          -- valid only in 5.1
  function(...) print(arg[1], ...) end  -- valid only in 5.1

Still, there is a remote chance that the 5.1 behavior is intended in
all cases above (e.g. when doing code generation).