Re: table output

[spir <denis.spir@...>]

Le Tue, 10 Nov 2009 12:33:13 -0200,
Roberto Ierusalimschy <roberto@inf.puc-rio.br> s'exprima ainsi:

> > > I'm sure everyone on this list has written a table serializer at some
> > > point.  Here's mine:
> > > http://www.mat.ucsb.edu/projects/luaAV/browser/trunk/extra/modules/serializer/init.lua
> > > 
> > > wes
> > 
> > Should this reply be understood as "there is a need for this in core lua"?
> 
> I think it should be understood as "it is not trivial to be concise,
> meaningful, unambiguous and fit for all purposes here, as a standard
> function would have to be." (thanks to Duncan.)
> 
> -- Roberto
> 

Well, while I understand that one can have this point of view, it's still surprising for me. From a rather practicle and everyday programming side, table output needs not be perfect, nore fit every possible use case, to be _extremely_ handy anyway. (Again, I'm not talking about serialization, or any other kind of machine-readable representation, even if it may also be, I'm talking of human feedback.) Nothing has to be perfect in a PL, no feature fits all purposes (think at tables themselves ;-).

People customize or build their own tools when needed. About output func, while I don't mean at all that commonly implemented features are supposed to be best, all languages I know output by default the content of their collection type(s), and most programmers use this feature numerous times every day; it's also the degbugging tool #1.

Now, I'll stop arguing ;-)

Denis
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