Recently Updated

Date	Module	Description	Version
2016-09-13	resty	resty-bundle: lua-resty-tags~1.0-303 : A small DSL for building HTML documents + lua-resty-nettle~0.95-103 : LuaJIT FFI bindings for Nettle (a low-level cryptographic library) + lua-resty...	0.78
2016-09-12	resty	resty-bundle: lua-resty-nettle~0.95-103 : LuaJIT FFI bindings for Nettle (a low-level cryptographic library) + lua-resty-libcjson~1.4-103 : LuaJIT FFI-based cJSON library (tested with Ope...	0.76
2016-09-12	resty	resty-bundle: lua-resty-uuid~1.1-103 : DCE compatible Universally Unique Identifier (UUID/GUID) library + lua-resty-nettle~0.95-103 : LuaJIT FFI bindings for Nettle (a low-level cryptogra...	0.77
2016-09-12	itertools	itertools : Functional iteration using coroutines	0.1-103
2016-09-11	gversion	gversion : Lua library for Gentoo-style versioning format	0.1.0-103
2016-09-11	resty	resty-bundle: lua-resty-nettle~0.95-103 : LuaJIT FFI bindings for Nettle (a low-level cryptographic library) + lua-resty-libcjson~1.4-103 : LuaJIT FFI-based cJSON library (tested with Ope...	0.75
2016-09-11	dromozoa	dromozoa-bundle: dromozoa-utf8~1.3-103 : Lua 5.3 compatible pure-Lua UTF-8 implementation + dromozoa-xml~1.5-103 : XML parser and toolkit + dromozoa-image~1.0-103 : Portable toolkit for m...	0.20
2016-09-09	resty	resty-bundle: lua-resty-passwdqc~1.0-103 : LuaJIT FFI bindings to libpasswdqc — a password / passphrase strength checking and policy enforcement toolset + lua-resty-libcjson~1.4-103 : L...	0.74
2016-09-09	llthreads2	lua-llthreads2 : Low-Level threads for Lua	0.1.4-103
2016-09-08	luapress	luapress : Luapress builds static sites from markdown files	3.4-3

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.