Introduction to Lua

Lua is a scripting language and is used in the WoW User Interface and addons.

• It's recommended to use a simple text editor like VS Code or Notepad++
• You will need an AddOn to test your code in, or the WowLua addon.

You can also use the Lua Demo or get Lua on your machine. Note that World of Warcraft uses Lua 5.1.

This guide will follow the Learn X in Y minutes format.

• Reference: PIL: Types and Values, Reference Manual

• Reference: PIL: Relational Operators, Logical Operators

• Reference: MathLibraryTutorial, Reference Manual

• Reference: String Manipulation, String Library Tutorial

Patterns

• Reference: PatternsTutorial, PIL: Patterns, Reference Manual

• Reference: PIL: Control Structures

• Reference: PIL: Functions

Syntactic sugar

• References: WowAce coding tips, Difference between . and : in Lua

• Reference: PIL: Tables, Tables Tutorial, Arrays

Sorting

Global Environment

• References: PIL: The Environment, Reference Manual

ipairs vs pairs

• References: For Tutorial, Difference between pairs and ipairs in Lua, PIL: Stateless Iterators

• Follow-up: Create a WoW AddOn in 15 Minutes

API Reference

• Lua functions - The Lua 5.1 API as implemented in WoW
• https://www.lua.org/manual/5.1/ - Reference Manual (5.1)

Tutorials

• https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads/817817-Creating-Your-Own-WoW-Addon - MMO-Champion tutorial
• https://www.lua.org/start.html - Getting started with Lua
• https://www.lua.org/pil/contents.html - Programming in Lua (online version)
• https://en.wikibooks.org/wiki/Lua_Programming - Wikibooks tutorial
• https://wiki.facepunch.com/gmod/Beginner_Tutorial_Intro - Garry's Mod tutorial
• https://developer.roblox.com/en-us/learn-roblox/coding-scripts - Roblox tutorial

Style Guides

These may be helpful for seeing what coding conventions other projects follow. See also Lua Coding Tips for best practices.

• https://github.com/Olivine-Labs/lua-style-guide/
• https://github.com/luarocks/lua-style-guide
• http://lua-users.org/wiki/LuaStyleGuide