Recently Updated

Date	Module	Description	Version
2018-08-14	mockuna	mockuna : A simple mocking framework for Lua	0.6-103
2018-08-14	chess	chess-fen : Chess position in FEN syntax	1.2-3
2018-08-14	llthreads2	lua-llthreads2 : Low-Level threads for Lua	0.1.5-103
2018-08-14	dromozoa	dromozoa-bundle: dromozoa-utf8~2.0-103 : Lua 5.3 compatible pure-Lua UTF-8 implementation + dromozoa-calendar~1.7-103 : Date functions and Japanese calendar + dromozoa-xml~1.5-103 : XML p...	0.51
2018-08-14	listutils	tableutils : Set of general-utility functions for working with tables	2.2.1-103
2018-08-14	randomdist	randomdist : a few simple procedures for generating random numbers.	1.5-3
2018-08-14	restserver	restserver : A simple server API for writing REST services running over WSAPI.	0.4-103
2018-08-14	public_suffix_list	public_suffix_list :	1.0.201808-103
2018-08-14	cliargs	lua_cliargs : A command-line argument parser.	3.0-203
2018-08-14	parsel	parsel : A simple, powerful parser for Lua with zero dependencies.	2.1.1-103

Install

Unzip the downloaded file into an arbitrary folder. This will create a single sub-folder named ulua which contains the ULua distribution:

ulua
├── lua.cmd           # LuaJIT executable for Windows.
├── lua               # LuaJIT executable for OSX and Linux.
├── host
│   ├── config.lua    # Global configuration (see PKG).
│   ├── init          # Initialization scripts folder.
│   ├── tmp           # Temporary files folder.
│   └── pkg           # Downloaded packages cache folder.
├── bin
│   ├── upkg.cmd      # Package manager executable for Windows.
│   ├── upkg          # Package manager executable for OSX and Linux.
│   └── ...           # Other executables depending on installed packages.
├── pkg               # Package manager package.
└── ...               # Other installed packages.

Run

The lua executable starts LuaJIT, the Lua manual and the LuaJIT manual document its usage:

# On Windows:
cd folder_containing_ulua/ulua
lua      [options] [script [args]]

# On OSX and Linux:
cd folder_containing_ulua/ulua
./lua    [options] [script [args]]

By default LuaJIT runs in 32-bit mode, to run it in 64-bit mode set the environment variable BIT=64:

set BIT=64       # On Windows.
export BIT=64    # On OSX and Linux.

On Linux, if LuaJIT 32-bit is executed on a distribution lacking the 32-bit C runtime, this will result in a meaningless error such as luajit: command not found. Either launch LuaJIT in 64-bit mode or install the required Linux libraries.

Packages

The upkg executable provides a convenient way of managing ULua:

# On Windows:
cd folder_containing_ulua/ulua/bin
upkg available     # List all available packages.
upkg add socket    # Download and install the socket package (LuaSocket library).
upkg add pl        # Download and install the pl package (PenLight library).
upkg update        # Update all packages to the latest version.

# On OSX and Linux:
cd folder_containing_ulua/ulua/bin
./upkg available     # List all available packages.
./upkg add socket    # Download and install the socket package (LuaSocket library).
./upkg add pl        # Download and install the pl package (PenLight library).
./upkg update        # Update all packages to the latest version.

ULua features LuaRocks integration: new and updated rocks are automatically tracked, compiled and made available in ULua. More than 300 of such packages are currently available for installation, see LuaRocks Modules.

ULua also features a number of Native packages, i.e. packages that are developed directly for ULua according to its package manager specifications.