What's the difference?

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#1

I’m not exactly sure how to call them, I was thinking of saying “inserting” and “indexing”, but i dont think thats correct, let me know tho.

However what would be the difference between the two?

t = {} -- table

-- Example 1:

table.insert(t, 1) -- inserts item  to table
print(table.find(t, 1)) -- prints if index was found ( 1 )

-- Example 2:

t[#t+1] = 1 -- Adds index by number of item's in a table
print(table.find(t, 1)) -- prints if index was found ( 1 )

The only difference I can think of might be their speed, is that all tho?

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#2

Honestly I dont know if there is any other difference than speed.
table.insert() is slightly faster

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#3

Ive always heard to use table.insert as it was faster, and Ive hate reading t[#t+1]

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#4

I believe table.insert is faster and that’s about it, I’ve only ever used example 2 for inserting functions into a table that I need to disconnect later as it was just easier to read.

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#5

Yup, for a benchmark test, with a loop of 10millions of iterations, I found a difference of 0.15 to 0.20 seconds, being table.insert() the faster one.

And yup haha the readability, but thats just matter of taste

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#6

I wonder if it uses rawset to be faster. because addition is pretty fast and it is the only thing I can think about being faster.

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#7

there isnt any difference except as the others say speed. but i am sure that the speed diffrence isnt THAT MUCH also t[#t+1] can sometimes be easier to read in some cases like

local yourmother = {}
for x = 1, 10 do
	yourmother[x] = {}
	for z = 1, 10 do
		yourmother[x][z] = {}
	end
end

local yourmother = {}
for x = 1, 10 do
	table.insert(yourmother,{})
	for z = 1, 10 do
		table.insert(yourmother[x],z) -- looks weird right and can be hard to understand.
	end
end
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#8

Ok, then i guess its basically what I said.

\ o_ o/ \ o _ o / \o _o /

no, I can understand both just fine.

#9

hmm well its just me then. oh well

yes

#10 
t[36][901234][3450435][1e4]["A Picture of a Dog"][496]
1 Like
#11

YEA SEE THATS EASIER!

#12 
table.insert(t, {{{{{{{{{{{}}}}}}}}}}})
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#13

Syntax-wise, just use table.insert much cleaner, also “future-proof”.

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#15 
local Damn = {}
if Damn["Yeah"] == nil then
	table.insert(Damn, "Yeah")
end
Damn[#Damn] = "Yeah"
for _,v in Damn do
	print(v.. " damnation "..v)
end
local Yeah = table.clone(Damn)
Yeah = {}
if Yeah["Damn"] == nil then
	table.insert(Yeah, "Damn")
end
Yeah[#Yeah] = "Damn"
for _ ,v in Yeah do
	print(v.." yeah "..v)
end

Well I mean to be fair, the second option does seem better but again syntax wise table insert is easier to read.

1 Like
#16

thats gonna be a pain to open.

#17

and thats gonna be a pain to read.

#18

AFAIK the reason t[#t+1] = v was ever a thing was because table.insert was slower than setting your indices in the table in the past. All the standard libraries have received up to significant internal performance improvements ever since Luau so a lot of developers have gone back to just using table.insert. For readability’s sake, even prior to Luau, I’ve always preferred using table.insert to be clear that I’m working with arrays and am adding an element to one.

BTW: clickbaity title. Maybe should explain a bit more, like “What’s the difference between these two ways of table inserts?” or something.

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#19

I wasnt sure what to call it. and I didnt know how to say it, but thanks for the suggestion.

#20

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