Lua on iOS (again) (was programming Lua with Coders for iPad)

["Matthew M. Burke" <matthew@...>]

I hope this doesn't trigger a long, off-topic thread about the cons and 
pros of iOS, but I think there is enough Lua-related value that a little 
more detail would be of interest:


1. Lua is now (and has been for a while) officially allowed in iOS 
applications.  Along, of course, with a number of other languages.

2.  As has been stated, it is not allowed for an app to download new code.

3.  It is, apparently, allowed to have apps where a user enters new code 
-- as long as she cannot then share it with others :(

I say "apparently" because the developer's agreement doesn't explicitly 
address this.  But as Alex mentioned, there are a couple of apps that 
expose Scheme REPLs.  There is also this Coders app -- which begat this 
thread.  Not to mention, iLuaBox is alive and well and has been in the 
app store for (I think) almost a year.

Oh, and I should mention, that there is an app to create and run your 
own Turing Machines (search for "Turing Machine Simulator").  I'm 
guessing no app approver ever took a theory of computation class :(


4. As Jim mentioned, you cannot "do level definitions in Lua and then 
store them on a website so they are dynamically downloaded and 
executed", although you can have level definitions in Lua that come 
bundled with the app.  It's probably ok even to have them disabled and 
require the user to purchase them via "In-App Purchasing".

Of course, like lawyers and the law, we can debate all we want, but we 
can't be sure until there's a ruling...

5.  Corona and Wax (2 frameworks for building iOS apps in Lua) are both 
alive and well!  Not to mention, quite a number of apps that take a more 
ad hoc approach to including Lua.


Matt

P.S.  Now at the risk of ruining the good intentions I stated in the 
first paragraph, I cannot resist mentioning that Briefs 
(http://giveabrief.com/, https://github.com/capttaco/Briefs) never 
managed to get approved for the App store despite (allegedly) high-level 
internal assistance!

To be clear, Briefs is in no way Lua, but it was rejected because "it 
uses a scripting language to alter the behavior of the app"  Note that 
this "scripting language" is nothing more than a "dumb" config file 
(i.e. no variables, no control structures...).  This rejection is 
particularly interesting in light of the approval of apps such as 
iMockups, Blueprint and AppCooker.