CODEWITHSUNDEEP
lua
bigtunacan
bigtunacan

Reputation: 4986

Lua call function from string on self?

How can you call a function name via a string in Lua on self?

I tried the techniques described on the similar question (lua call function from a string with function name), however this only addresses calling functions that exist on the global table, or through modules; it does not work on self.

Here is a simplified example of what I'm trying to do.

function CardsScene:onEnterFrame()
  if self.transition_complete then
    loadstring("self.basicMathInit")()
  end
end


function CardsScene:basicMathInit()
  print("Init has been called.")
end

This results in the following error.

scenes/CardsScene.lua:83: attempt to call a nil value

Upvotes: 3

Views: 3782

Answers (1)

Nicol Bolas
Nicol Bolas

Reputation: 473232

self is not magic. It's just a local variable, no different from any other Lua variable.

If you want to get a global function by its string name, you would access the global table with that string: _G[string_name]. _G is not magic; it's just a table.

Just like self. So you would do the exact same thing for getting access to members of self by name: self[string_name]. If that represents a function, you would call it with function call syntax: self[string_name]().

Upvotes: 5

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