User:xLEGOx
Image help for my RPG
Scripting tutorial, Wiki format under construction
Lesson-1
NOTE: In this tutorial we will be using the "print()" command. All this does is print whatever is in the brackets to the output bar for example, print(1), makes the text "1" appear in the output bar
Also, if in a script you see this "-->" that means, "the outcome of this line is : ", and isn’t actually part of the script. It's a Comment, and wont actually be part of your script, the computer just ignores it.
Declaring and using variables
What is a variable? A variable is a thing that stores a value. It could be any kind of value, such as a color, position, number, work/sentence etc... In programming, Variables are a core aspect, most (if not all) scripts you make will have them.
How do you declare a variable in Lua? Declaring variables in Lua is very easy, all you have to do it put the name of the variable, and then the assignment operator, and then the value of the variable.
The only thing to note is that you variable name MUST NOT HAVE SPACES IN THEM, it will mess up your script if they do
a = 1 b = 3.14 c = 600 print(a) --> 1 print(b) --> 3.14 print(c) --> 600
Now we move onto the types of data that a variable in Lua can store, there are 6 main types that I will discuss here.
Bool:
The Bool data type is the most simple one, it's either true or it's false, those are the only two things it can be
a = false print(a) --> false a = true print(a) --> true
Number:
Also, a number, quite obvious as well. In Lua you don’t have to worry about the size of a number, like you do in C++, if it's a number it's a number.
a = 1 print(a) --> 1 a = 3.14 print(a) --> 3.14
also, you may see this
- e+###
this just means exponential notation
3.5e+004 = 3.5*10^4
String:
Now we get to the new stuff....
A string, is a "String of characters", it can be one anything from one single letter, to a whole sentence. To tell the computer you are using a string The string must be enclosed in quotes
myString = "Hello, World!"
print(myString) --> Hello, World!
print("hello!") --> Hello!
The quotes aren’t actually part of the string, they just tell the computer what's in the quotes is a string.
Object:
As you already know, ROBLOX is build out of objects. Most of them being of the "Part" class, or bricks, but there are any others as well.
What an object Value does is store the memory location of tone of these objects, so that you can talk about it even if it doesn’t have a parent that you can access it through.
a = game.Workspace.Part --we will discuss this next lesson print(a) --> part a:remove() --> removes the part
Next we will look at the compound data types, these are ROBLOX specific, and thus must be called with the .new() command.
Vector3:
A vector3 stores a position in space, based on z-y-x coordinates also, vector3's have a ".magnitude" property in them, which tells you the length of the vector, from one corner, to the opposite corner.
a = Vector3.new(1, 5, 3) print(a) --> 1, 5, 3 print(a.x) --> 1 print(a.y) --> 5 print(a.z --> 3 print(a.magnitude) --> [I'm not sure, I'd have to calculate it, but it should be around 6.5]
CFrame:
CFrames store a position in space, and a rotation matrix, but they're quite complicated, and I will discuss them in a later lesson.
BrickColor:
The brickcolor data type stores the color of a brick. brickcolor, for the purposes of this lesson they return a color based off of a number.
You can see a list of all of the codes, and what color they are, in your program files, inside the "res" folder, called "htmlcolortree"
a = BrickColor.new(21) print(a) --> Bright Red a = BrickColor.new(23) print(a) --> Bright Blue
How do I use variables?
You use variables in nearly all of the scripts you make as stated before, here is an example of a script that prints a number
addendOne = 1 addendTwo = 5 sum = 0 sum = addendOne + addendTwo print(sum) --> 6
Try putting this in a script in Roblox... Go File>New, and select workspace, and insert a script into it. Then paste this into the script and Press run (the green arrow at the top of the screen), and see what happens.
If you don’t have the output window open, then View>Output and it should appear at the bottom of the screen
When you run the text "6" should appear in the output.
you can try fiddling around some more if you want, and using the division "/", multiplication "*", and subtraction "-" symbols and seeing what happens
Now you know how to use basic variables, we can move on to How objects work in ROBLOX.
