Re: BASIC-like Lua variant

[Fabien <fleutot+lua@...>]

On Wed, Jan 15, 2014 at 7:45 PM, Marc Balmer <marc@msys.ch> wrote:

Am 14.01.2014 12:26, schrieb colinz@gmx.com:

Is there some Lua variant or module that lets the programmer use a more
BASIC-like syntax? Would this be even possible?

no.

To elaborate a bit on Marc's true but terse answer: it would be possible to make some tweaks to Lua's syntax, which would make it look more similar to BASIC. But it would hurt BASIC people, not help them.

While the surface syntax could be made similar, there would be plenty of dangerous corner cases to watch out, where the Lua/BASIC hybrid would behave subtly different from what you'd expect from BASIC. To fix them, you'd need both an intimate knowledge of Lua and an intimate knowledge of the Lua/BASIC wrapper. That's much harder than spending a day or two getting familiar with Lua's syntax.

Or you could restrict your language to the intersection of Lua and BASIC that can be easily and faithfully encoded into one another, but then, don't: embed a real BASIC, not a bastardized Lua!

Are there Lua learning resources / tools specifically for programmers
who have a BASIC background?

No but you don't need the resource to be BASIC-specific. Take "programming in Lua", it's easily readable by people with limited experience in programming; whether this experience was in BASIC or something else doesn't change much of anything.

Finally, if you're worried about other people's ability to learn Lua (as opposed to yours), experience shows that you shouldn't. Non-developers typically pick up what they need in a day or so of practice, as discussed for instance here http://lua-users.org/lists/lua-l/2004-04/msg00164.html.