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Discussed for years, Lua was installed in 2012 for testing on [[test2wiki:|test2.wikipedia.org]], with open invitation to all editors to experiment with developing Lua modules. Lua was installed on the English Wikipedia in February 2013, after testing on mediawiki.org and Wikimedia test wikis.
<nowiki>Insert non-formatted text here</nowiki>== About Lua ==
:''See also [[:File:WMF\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\ -- Declare a local variable and assign data to it.
:''See also [[:File:WMF Tech Talk 2013-02-28 slides - Scribunto presentation.pdf|Brad Jorsch's short presentation for a basic example of how to convert a wikitext template into a Lua module (PDF).]]''
Lua is a [[scripting language]] which can be used to analyze data, calculate expressions, and format results using functions or [[object-oriented programming]]. Although some Lua scripts can be kept simple, for easy understanding, Lua allows complex structures including tables, dynamic functions, and [[associative array]]s where index [[subscript]]s can be words as well as index numbers. Lua also supports [[recursion]] of re-nested functions, so care should be taken to avoid excessive complexity where other users would not understand how to maintain a Lua module. The following is an example of Lua [[source code]] for a [[hello world]] function contained in [[Module:HelloWorld]]:
<syntaxhighlight lang="lua">
-- All Lua modules on Wikipedia must begin by defining a variable that will hold their
-- externally accessible functions. They can have any name and may also hold data.
my_object = {};
-- Add a function to the variable. These are callable in Wikipedia via the #invoke command.
-- "frame" will contain the data that Wikipedia sends this function when it is called.
my_object.hello = function( frame )
-- Declare a local variable and assign data to it.
local str = "Hello World!"
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