Plugin. lua source code to table and reverse

[boeljoet]

here is a challenge i cant find an answer to.

i have a script with a source code of a table

materials = {
	["metal"]={
		["Material"]= Enum.Material.Metal;
		--["Wood"]=			{["Level"]=0;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(146,142,133)};
		["stone"]=			{["Level"]=1;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(146,142,133)};
		["brass"]=			{["Level"]=2;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(128,74,0)};
		["Copper"]=			{["Level"]=3;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
		["Iron"]=			{["Level"]=4;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(161,157,148)};
		["Steel"]=			{["Level"]=5;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
		["Mothrill"]=		{["Level"]=6;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(174,187,219)};
		["Adamantine"]=		{["Level"]=7;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
		["Emerald"]=		{["Level"]=8;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
		["Cerussite"]=		{["Level"]=9;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
	};
}
return materials

this is not a module script (little bit more complicated but lets keep it on this)
this is the only code in that script.

in the plugin i want to get the source of the lua container and turn it into a table.

and alsow the otehr way around.
so i have the table somewhere in my plugin and i want to replace the script source with the table

[PatAmigos_0 (tohue)]

Converting Script Source to Table

To convert the source code of a Lua script into a table, you can use the loadstring function (don’t forget to turn it on because i did!).

local scriptSource = [[
materials = {
	["metal"]={
		["Material"]= Enum.Material.Metal;
		--["Wood"]=			{["Level"]=0;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(146,142,133)};
		["stone"]=			{["Level"]=1;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(146,142,133)};
		["brass"]=			{["Level"]=2;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(128,74,0)};
		["Copper"]=			{["Level"]=3;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
		["Iron"]=			{["Level"]=4;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(161,157,148)};
		["Steel"]=			{["Level"]=5;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
		["Mothrill"]=		{["Level"]=6;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(174,187,219)};
		["Adamantine"]=		{["Level"]=7;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
		["Emerald"]=		{["Level"]=8;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
		["Cerussite"]=		{["Level"]=9;		["Color"]=Color3.fromRGB(0,0,0)};
	};
}
return materials
]]

local func = loadstring(scriptSource)
local materials = func()
print(materials["metal"]["stone"]["Level"]) -- Output: 1

Converting Table to Script Source

To convert a table back into a Lua script source, you can serialize the table into a string. Here’s a simple function to do that:

local function serializeTable(tbl, indent)
	indent = indent or 0
	local toReturn = "{\n"
	local indentStr = string.rep("\t", indent + 1)
	for k, v in pairs(tbl) do
		local key = type(k) == "string" and string.format("[\"%s\"]", k) or string.format("[%d]", k)
		if type(v) == "table" then
			toReturn = toReturn .. indentStr .. key .. " = " .. serializeTable(v, indent + 1) .. ",\n"
		elseif type(v) == "string" then
			toReturn = toReturn .. indentStr .. key .. " = \"" .. v .. "\",\n"
		elseif type(v) == "number" or type(v) == "boolean" then
			toReturn = toReturn .. indentStr .. key .. " = " .. tostring(v) .. ",\n"
		elseif typeof(v) == "Color3" then
			toReturn = toReturn .. indentStr .. key .. " = Color3.fromRGB(" .. v.R * 255 .. "," .. v.G * 255 .. "," .. v.B * 255 .. "),\n"
		elseif typeof(v) == "EnumItem" then
			toReturn = toReturn .. indentStr .. key .. " = Enum." .. tostring(v.EnumType) .. "." .. v.Name .. ",\n"
		end
	end
	toReturn = toReturn .. string.rep("\t", indent) .. "}"
	return toReturn
end

local scriptSource = "materials = " .. serializeTable(materials) .. "\nreturn materials"
print(scriptSource)

Using in a plugin

In your plugin, you can use these functions to read the script source, convert it to a table, modify it, and then convert it back to a script source. Here’s a basic example:

local scriptSource = script.Source
local func = loadstring(scriptSource)
local materials = func()

-- Modify the table as needed
materials["metal"]["Copper"]["Color"] = Color3.fromRGB(255, 0, 0)

-- Convert the table back to a script source
local newScriptSource = "materials = " .. serializeTable(materials) .. "\nreturn materials"
script.Source = newScriptSource

Hope it helps!