How to clear rows of a table

Help and Feedback Scripting Support
#1

I wanting to keep my players inventory clean and as ‘empty’ as possible, so when the player leaves I wanna basically shorten their inventory down.

Few key points

  1. Every 5 slots is a row/line
  2. Slots 1-30 should remain untouched

So quick example, let’s say this is the players Inventory when they leave.

 local Inventory = {
        [1] = {},
        [2] = {},
        [3] = {},
        [4] = {},
        [5] = {},
        [6] = {},
        [7] = {},
        [8] = {},
        [9] = {},
        [10] = {},
        [11] = {},
        [12] = {},
        [13] = {},
        [14] = {},
        [15] = {},
        [16] = {},
        [17] = {},
        [18] = {},
        [19] = {},
        [20] = {},
        [21] = {},
        [22] = {},
        [23] = {},
        [24] = {},
        [25] = {},
        [26] = {},
        [27] = {},
        [28] = {},
        [29] = {},
        [30] = {},
        [31] = {},
        [32] = {},
        [33] = {},
        [34] = {},
        [35] = {},
        [36] = {},
        [37] = {},
        [38] = {Id = "25", Quantity = 12},
        [39] = {},
        [40] = {},
        [41] = {},
        [42] = {},
        [43] = {},
        [44] = {},
        [45] = {}
   }

So slots 1-30, do not get touched, regardless if they empty or not.

Slots 31-35 (all of those slots are empty, so remove them) Slots 36-40 have an item (38) so we keep them, slots 41-45 are all empty, remove them.

However, when removing 31-35, 36-40 should move down and take their place. I don’t want

 local Inventory = {
        [1] = {},
        [2] = {},
        [3] = {},
        [4] = {},
        [5] = {},
        [6] = {},
        [7] = {},
        [8] = {},
        [9] = {},
        [10] = {},
        [11] = {},
        [12] = {},
        [13] = {},
        [14] = {},
        [15] = {},
        [16] = {},
        [17] = {},
        [18] = {},
        [19] = {},
        [20] = {},
        [21] = {},
        [22] = {},
        [23] = {},
        [24] = {},
        [25] = {},
        [26] = {},
        [27] = {},
        [28] = {},
        [29] = {},
        [30] = {},
        [36] = {},
        [37] = {},
        [38] = {Id = "25", Quantity = 12},
        [39] = {},
        [40] = {},
   }
1 Like
#2

I think I finally got it, but I will apologize in advanced for the messy code. Not sure if this is the most efficient way of handling it, but it works!

Edit: deleted the inventory variable below since it was so big.
Edit 2: fixed a mistake in loop

-- call this function when you need to clean the inventory
function cleanInventory(inventory) -- input inventory into function
	local function isEmpty(item) -- a local function that checks to see if a slot it empty
		for _, value in pairs(item) do
			return false
		end
		return true
	end
	
	local size = #inventory
	local needToCheck = size - 30
	if size > 30 then -- made a check just in case?
		local check = 0
		local loop = true
		while loop do
			local canClear = true
			for i = 31 + check, 35 + check, 1 do
				if inventory[i] and not isEmpty(inventory[i]) then
					canClear = false
				elseif inventory[i] == nil then
					loop = false
				end
			end
			if canClear then
				for j = 1, 5 do
					table.remove(inventory, 31 + check)
				end
			end
			check += 5
		end
	end
	return inventory
end

cleanInventory(Inventory) -- input the table reference into the function
print(Inventory)

Hope this helps! Let me know if something is wrong with the code.

1 Like
#3

If you want to simulate a matrix and/or rows/columns you should be using arrays of arrays, or at least arrays with multiple values.

#4 
local Inventory = {
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{Id = "25", Quantity = 12},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{},
	{}
}

local function clearTable()
	for i, v in ipairs(Inventory) do
		if i > 30 and (i - 1) % 5 == 0 then
			for i2 = 4, 0, -1 do
				if not Inventory[i + i2]["Id"] then
					if i2 == 0 then
						for i3 = 4, 0, -1 do
							table.remove(Inventory, i + i3)
						end
					end
				else
					break
				end
			end
		end
	end
end

clearTable()
print(Inventory[33]["Id"], Inventory[33]["Quantity"])
--25, 12 is output
#5

I need them in an order, as when player rejoins it should remember the exact slot where each item is stored

#6

The way you indexed your array (with indices using integer values 1 through n, with n being the length of the array) is the default way arrays are indexed.

local Inventory = {
	[1] = {},
	[2] = {},
	[3] = {},
	[4] = {},
	[5] = {},
	[6] = {},
	[7] = {},
	[8] = {},
	[9] = {},
	[10] = {},
	[11] = {},
	[12] = {},
	[13] = {},
	[14] = {},
	[15] = {},
	[16] = {},
	[17] = {},
	[18] = {},
	[19] = {},
	[20] = {},
	[21] = {},
	[22] = {},
	[23] = {},
	[24] = {},
	[25] = {},
	[26] = {},
	[27] = {},
	[28] = {},
	[29] = {},
	[30] = {},
	[31] = {},
	[32] = {},
	[33] = {},
	[34] = {},
	[35] = {},
	[36] = {},
	[37] = {},
	[38] = {Id = "25", Quantity = 12},
	[39] = {},
	[40] = {},
	[41] = {},
	[42] = {},
	[43] = {},
	[44] = {},
	[45] = {}
}

local function clearTable()
	for i, v in ipairs(Inventory) do
		if i > 30 and (i - 1) % 5 == 0 then
			for i2 = 4, 0, -1 do
				if not Inventory[i + i2]["Id"] then
					if i2 == 0 then
						for i3 = 4, 0, -1 do
							table.remove(Inventory, i + i3)
						end
					end
				else
					break
				end
			end
		end
	end
end

clearTable()
print(Inventory[33]["Id"], Inventory[33]["Quantity"])
--25, 12 is output

This produces the same result.