Comments (Scripting)

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Revision as of 21:50, 26 December 2011 by >Flurite (→‎Comments)
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Comments

An example of a comment in Studio. The comment is on the first line and is in green font.

A comment in Lua is text that is completely ignored by the parser. Comments are annotations by the writer of a program to explain what the intent of the program is. Comments in ROBLOX Studio's editor are shown in green.

Single-line Comments

A comment starts anywhere with a double hyphen (--) and runs until the end of the line:

Example
-- This is an example of a comment


Block Comments

Lua also offers block comments, which start with the first double brackets and run until the corresponding double brackets:

Example
--[[
This is an example 
of a block comment.    
]]


Notice how this comment is on more than one line. In the first example, it is limited to one line.

Leveled Comments

Leveled comments are comments that have different levels of toleration for lower-leveled comments, such as the above block comment.

Example
--[=[
This is a level 1 comment.
]=]

Below is a level 2 comment, there is no limit to what level a comment is on. But a level 1 comment cannot hold a level 2 or higher, and so forth...

--[==[
This is a level 2 comment.
]==]


Strategies for Useful Commenting

Writing useful commentary is almost as hard as writing the code itself. It is all too easy to write whatever the code does, but not why it does so or the super-objective of the code.

1. Comment and Code in Paragraphs

Write your code and comments in paragraph form. Break each piece of code into sequences that achieve a single task with comments in-between.

2. Precede Comments by a Blank Line

Doing this creates a distinct separation between your code and comments. Plus, it’s visually pleasing.

3. Don't Insult Anyone's Intelligence

All commenting is not productive commenting. Too many comments can make your code less meaningful and therefore less readable. Tell us why, not how.

4. Be Consistent

There are many beliefs on the proper way to comment code. Some feel comments should be so detailed that a non programmer could follow the logic, while others believe you use comments for support. What matters most is that you are consistent in your commenting style. This helps your reader know what to expect when going through several different projects.

5. Comment While You Code

The chances of you commenting a finished project are slim, so do yourself a favor and comment your code immediately, so you can come back later and know what that piece of code was doing.

See Also