LÖVE

another question:

Let's say I start a main.lua with require 'needed file.' Now let's go to that required file. There, I've gotten into the habit of creating a need.Load(), a need.Draw(), and a need.update(), and I load them in the obvious place in main.lua.

My question is about the need.Load(). What should I include in it? And what can I leave out of it? Function definitions?

This will be more individual preference, but at the very least put anything that is only important to that file inside that load() function. When you "require" a file, Lua/LOVE runs through the file and creates variables for everything that is exposed to the global scope. So if I had this file:
As soon as I require that file, all the images will be loaded, even if I do not need them until I call load(). So, you'd want to put those images in the load function, so that they will only get loaded when load() is called. Beyond that, I usually don't bother putting things like other requires inside a function.

So if I don't put things specifically into load() (or some other, callable function), then they'll exist around forever as global variables, cluttering up memory?

Pretty much. There's probably more to it, but that's the extent of my understanding.

Building off of Marekk's point, it's good practice to never have anything defined that isn't inside a function. Yes, you can accurately predict when stuff will get loaded if you're paying attention, but in six months when you want to make a small change, walking through your code again just to find variables you didn't put into functions... it can be a pain. Better to use love.load as it is meant to be used, and then follow a similar pattern for your requires.

Robin wrote:You should use periods as separators. It's just that LÖVE is currently pretty lenient in what it allows, but that might change in the future.

update: I'm exploring how to call pictures within folders, and

hop0=love.graphics.newImage("pics/hop0.png") works, but
hop0=love.graphics.newImage("pics.hop0.png") does not.

When I look into folders, should I always use '/', or only do so within certain circumstances?

sanjiv wrote:

Robin wrote:You should use periods as separators. It's just that LÖVE is currently pretty lenient in what it allows, but that might change in the future.

update: I'm exploring how to call pictures within folders, and

hop0=love.graphics.newImage("pics/hop0.png") works, but
hop0=love.graphics.newImage("pics.hop0.png") does not.

When I look into folders, should I always use '/', or only do so within certain circumstances?

I always use '/'. It seems to work all the time. Use that.

sanjiv wrote:

Robin wrote:You should use periods as separators. It's just that LÖVE is currently pretty lenient in what it allows, but that might change in the future.

update: I'm exploring how to call pictures within folders, and

hop0=love.graphics.newImage("pics/hop0.png") works, but
hop0=love.graphics.newImage("pics.hop0.png") does not.

When I look into folders, should I always use '/', or only do so within certain circumstances?

newImage is dealing with a specific file, so use / as your separator. require deals with modules, so use periods. I know that the two appear similar but they're not quite the same thing.

Thanks! So slashes for specific files, and periods for folders? Or periods for .lua files as well?

Slashes for everything except the require function, which takes a 'module' as an argument rather than a folder or a file (the implementation of the module argument is a folder or a file, but without the file extension and using . instead of / to represent directory structure).