Loop through table in order?

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#1

Silly question, but how would I loop through this table in the same order it was written in?

local table1 = {
[1] = {Name = "bla"},
[2] = {Name = "bla2"},
[3] = {Name = "bla3"}
}
4 Likes
#2

Use a for index, key in ipairs() loop

a = {"one", "two", "three"}
for i, v in ipairs(a) do
  print(i, v)
end

Result:

1   one
2   two
3   three

With pairs():

a = {"one", "two", "three"}
for i, v in pairs(a) do
  print(i, v)
end

Result:

1   one
2   three
3   two

To be more precise

16 Likes
#3

I don’t know if it would work or not but maybe a function or a while true do loop? Just thinking on the top of my mind.

#4

If it’s just a numerical index generated by table.insert or you don’t manually enter a number that doesn’t follow the order of a +1 index then you could use.

for i = 1, #table1 do
print(table1[i].Name)
end

or for i,v in ipairs/pairs recommended by Xx1Luffy1xX

1 Like
#5

You would use ipairs as mentioned along as it’s an array otherwise that specific iterator will skip over non-numerical indexes :

for _,v in ipairs(table1) do
      print(v.Name) --->>  bla,  bla2, bla3
end

Or a for loop:

for i =1 , #table1 do
     print(table1[i].Name) --->>  bla,  bla2, bla3
end

for a dictionary however, if you were wondering, which are usually in arbitrary order btw, you would need to order them when new indexes are added to the table , which means using a custom iterator you could do something like:


local T = function(t,...) 
 for i, v in ipairs(t)do
	if typeof(v) == "table" then
	t[i] = {next(v)}
	end
  end
  setmetatable(t,t)
  t. __newindex = function(Table, index, value)
	rawset(Table, #Table + 1, {index, value})
   end
return t
end


local function OrderedPairs(t)	
       local i = 0 
     return function()
         i = i + 1
         if t[i] then
	     if typeof(t[i]) == "number" then
		return i, t[i]
       	end
         return t[i][1] or i , t[i][2] or t[i]
        end
   end
end







local Table = T{  {test123 = 2}   } -- values have to be defined in tables when using non-numerical indexes on table creation  




table.insert(Table,  "Val1")

Table["Foo"] = "bar"

Table["Test1"] = 10


for _,v in OrderedPairs(Table) do
    print(_, v) --- >>>> test123 : 2,  1 : Val1 , Foo: bar,  Test1 : 10
end
4 Likes
#6

You can simply use a numerical loop such as the following

local table1 = {
    [1] = {Name = "bla"},
    [2] = {Name = "bla2"},
    [3] = {Name = "bla3"}
}

for i = 1, #table1 do
    local currentInteration = table1[i]
end
#7

As others have stated above, numerical for loop is the way to go for this.

Pairs doesn’t guarantee order.

1 Like
#8

Not sure if you’re agreeing with me but i clearly stated how pairs() didn’t guarantee order,

2 Likes
#9

The title clearly says ‘in order’ , but my bad, didn’t read that part where you said that.

#10

Yeah I probably shouldn’t have included that. However many people confuse ipairs with pairs and it was a great way to show one of the differences between the two

1 Like
#11

I assume this is just a typo, but the index of 3 still has the value “three” associated with it.

2 Likes