The given options (see below) are executed and then the Lua program in file prog is loaded and executed. The given args are available to prog as strings in a global table named arg. If these arguments contain spaces or other characters special to the shell, then they should be quoted (but note thatthe quotes will be removed by the shell).
Options start with - and are described below. You can use "--" to signal the end of options.
If no arguments are given, then "-v -i" is assumed when the standard input is a terminal; otherwise, "-" is assumed. Interactive mode is explained in detail below.
- load the standard input as a file, that is, not interactively, even when the standard input is a terminal.
-e "stat" execute statement stat. You need to quote stat if it contains spaces, quotes, or other characters special to the shell.
-f "file" collect all remaining arguments as strings into a global table named arg and then execute file. The arguments in arg start at 0, which contains the string `file'. The index of the last argument is stored in "arg.n".
-i enter interactive mode after prog is executed. In this mode, lua prompts the user, reads lines from the standard input, and executes them as they are read. If a line does not contain a complete statement, then a secondary prompt is displayed and lines are read until a complete statement is formed or a syntax error is found. So, one way to interrupt the reading of an incomplete statement is to force a syntax error: adding a `;' in the middle of a statement is a sure way of forcing a syntax error (except inside multiline strings and comments; these must be closed explicitly). If a line starts with `=', then lua displays the values of all the expressions in the remainder of the line. The expressions must be separated by commas. The primary prompt is the value of the global variable _PROMPT, if this value is a string; otherwise, the default prompt is used. Similarly, the secondary prompt is the value of the global variable _PROMPT2. So, to change the prompts, set the corresponding variable to a string of your choice. You can do that after calling the interpreter or on the command line with "_PROMPT" "=\'lua: \'", for example. (Note the need for quotes, because the string contains a space.) The default prompts are ``> '' and ``>> ''.
-l "file" load and execute the given file before executing prog. Typically used to load libraries (hence the letter l)
-v print version information.