Re: any easy 'batteries-included' way of installing Lua on linux (ubuntu to be specific)

[Chris Babcock <cbabcock@...>]

On Thu, Mar 3, 2011 at 1:06 PM, Enrico Tassi <gareuselesinge@libero.it> wrote:
> The point of not having a meta-package depending a standard set of
> libraries is that there is no such standard set, and this is IMO one of
> the biggest problems of this technology (Lua I mean, not your linux
> distribution).

A more politic way to say this might be that Lua offers no pretensions
to a standard toolkit because neither the language nor the community
makes any assumption about the jobs for which you'll be using it.

It's generally not safe to assume that Lua will be running in a
general purpose environment where a full stack approach would be
useful or that having a full stack implementation available is
completely without a downside. The negative consequences of the
meta-package approach range in embedded applications is time lost
debugging code that "works just fine in the tests" on a work station.
The security implications of having luasocket accidentally available
in an extension environment include, "Oh, CRAP! One of my players used
my mail server to send half a million Viagra adverts before I could
shut down his account. Also, if new Lua users come to think of the
tools in the full stack tool kit as standard equipment for Lua, that
makes Lua less attractive as an extension or embedding language.
"Batteries included" is great marketing, but it's not practical for
two of the major use cases for Lua.

Also, it's not as simple as identifying a leading library for each
tool in the hypothetical toolbox. Unless the best tool for the job is
completely unencumbered, it's not going to be the best tool for
everyone. So, if you thought the "anointing" issue was hard, let's
open up THAT can of worms. ;)

Chris
--
Yippee-ki-yay, coffee maker.