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Lua - Multidimensional Lists
A multidimensional list can be implemented in Lua as a table of tables. A table in Lua is a versatile data structure and we can store any Lua object in a table even a table as well. This nesting capability allows Lua to create multidimensional lists.
Creating a multidimensional List
We can initialize a Multidimensional list during declaration as shown below −
main.lua
-- Initializing a list as 2 x 3 matrix local matrix = { {1, 2, 3}, {4, 5, 6} } -- Accessing the list -- using multiple indexes print(matrix[1][1]) -- prints 1, row 1, column 1 print(matrix[2][1]) -- prints 4, row 2, column 1
Output
When we run the above code, we will get the following output−
1 4
Dynamically initializing a multidimensional List
We can create a Multidimensional list dynamically as well as shown below−
main.lua
-- create an empty matrix local matrix = {} -- initialize matrix as 2 x 2 for i= 1, 2 do matrix[i] = {} -- create a new row for j = 1, 2 do matrix[i][j] = i * 10 + j end end -- Accessing the list -- using multiple indexes print(matrix[1][1]) -- prints 1, row 1, column 1 print(matrix[2][1]) -- prints 4, row 2, column 1
Output
When we run the above code, we will get the following output−
11 21
Iterating through Multidimensional list
We can iterate a Multidimensional list using nested loops −
main.lua
-- Initializing a list as 2 x 3 matrix local matrix = { {1, 2, 3}, {4, 5, 6} } -- iterate rows for i = 1, #matrix do -- iterate through columns of the current row for j = 1, #matrix[i] do print(string.format("Element at [%d][%d]: %d", i, j, matrix[i][j])) end end
Output
When we run the above code, we will get the following output−
Element at [1][1]: 1 Element at [1][2]: 2 Element at [1][3]: 3 Element at [2][1]: 4 Element at [2][2]: 5 Element at [2][3]: 6
Iterating through 3 dimensional list
In similar fashion, we can iterate a 3d list using nested loops −
main.lua
-- Initializing 3d list local threeDList = { { {1, 2}, {3, 4} }, { {5, 6}, {7, 8} } } -- iterate through first dimension for i = 1, #threeDList do -- iterate through second dimension for j = 1, #threeDList[i] do -- iterate through third dimension for k = 1, #threeDList[i][j] do print(string.format("Element at [%d][%d][%d]: %d", i, j, k, threeDList[i][j][k])) end end end
Output
When we run the above code, we will get the following output−
Element at [1][1][1]: 1 Element at [1][1][2]: 2 Element at [1][2][1]: 3 Element at [1][2][2]: 4 Element at [2][1][1]: 5 Element at [2][1][2]: 6 Element at [2][2][1]: 7 Element at [2][2][2]: 8