RE: level argument for assert

[Thijs Schreijer <thijs@...>]

> Due to the behaviour of argument lists, it doesn't make sense for a level
> argument:
> the error message would be dropped in any case; and the multi-return would
> fail.

Well, if you use it to return function values (more than 1), just leave the optional level argument out.

See this code example;

-- wrapper; extend assert with level argument
assert = function(test, msg, level, ...)
  if test then return test, msg, level, ... end
  error(msg, (level or 1) + 1) -- +1 is for this wrapper
end

-- Daurnimator code
function foo(some_cond)
  assert(type(some_cond) == "boolean", "Must call foo() with a boolean", 2)
  local data1, data2, data3 = "data1", "data2", "data3"
  if some_cond then
    return data1, data2, data3
  else
    return nil , "an error message"
  end
end

print("Testing assert()\n")
print("Succesfull call:", pcall(assert, foo(true)))
print("Erroneous call :", pcall(assert, foo(false)))
print("Caveat         :", pcall(assert, foo(false), 2))  -- foo return list is reduced, errmsg is lost!
print("Argument error :", foo("string"))

It will output;
Testing assert()

Succesfull call:	true	data1	data2	data3
Erroneous call :	false	an error message
Caveat         :	false	2
lua: asserttest.lua:22: Must call foo() with a boolean
stack traceback:
	[C]: in function 'error'
	asserttest.lua:3: in function 'assert'
	asserttest.lua:9: in function 'foo'
	asserttest.lua:22: in main chunk
	[C]: ?

So to me it works perfectly well, the one caveat being that if you use it to check on returned function values, you cannot use the level argument with functions that return more than 1 value.
The upside is that it becomes very easy to use the other very common use of assert; argument checking (the way I added it to foo() in the example) with a proper level reported to the enduser.

Thijs