Beginning Lua Programming

Chapter 19. Fitting into the Lua Community

You're now familiar with the basics of the Lua language, its core libraries, and a sample of the libraries and applications that developers around the world have made for Lua. The last topic you'll explore in this book involves the vibrant community that has developed around Lua and the resources that can help you with your software development. You'll learn about the following:

• The Lua web site

• The Lua reference manual

• The Lua mailing list

• LuaForge, the principal repository for Lua-based projects

• The Lua wiki

• The Lua chat room

There is a lot of Lua expertise in the community and insight into the way Lua works. Help is available to you in the form of printed and online documents, and discussions on the mailing lists, forums, and chat rooms. The niches these resources fill overlap, sometimes broadly, and you'll find a combination of them is sometimes needed to understand an issue thoroughly. Nevertheless, you can expedite the process of getting over hurdles by selecting the right resources to draw on.

Whether you've got a particular question regarding Lua, you're interested in seeing what people are doing with the language, or you want to contribute in some way to Lua's ongoing success, you'll find a suitable venue among these resources.

The Lua Web Site

The Lua team — Roberto Ierusalimschy, Luiz Henrique de Figueiredo, and Waldemar Celes — maintains a well-organized website at lua.org that serves as the official home of Lua. It's where you should ...