variables with a space in them

[Ernestyna]

hello!

at first, i'd like to say i have no experience with lua coding nor know how it works. i am an admin on a fandom wiki so i guess my coding skills only come to some limited html expressions. so sorry if i use some incorrect wording!

yesterday i decided to implement a new module to our wiki called Line distributions. basically, it just shows a ranking of the group's members based on how much they sang in a song. it uses local groups with members to work properly where some of the members have a space in their name, e.g. "Kim Lip", "Go Won", or "Olivia Hye". it also uses another module, called Index to attribute each members their respective color. this is where my problem arises. i cannot enter a variable with a space in it, otherwise the whole code would break. temporarily, i have conjoined the two-worded names of members as this feature is still in a testing phase so it wouldn't make much of a difference for the admins anyway. so my question is—is it possible to make a variable with a space in it? i have tried adding an underscore or a plus symbol, even an invisible special symbol, however none of these seem to work like i'd like to.

i'm looking forward to your response. if you wish to see how the module works, you can see it in my sandbox page. feel free to edit anything too, lol. there are some other few issues but i'll come back to these later. thank you so much!!!

[Spar]

You can't. But you can either:

1. transform input to snake_case before making a variable (applicable only if generate Lua script by some other script)
2. Store them as string keys in the table. {["Key with spaces"] = "some value"}

 

Probably you don't even need to name them as variable names. Table will be fine.

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[Pierpaolo BERNARDI]

On Mon, Jul 13, 2026 at 12:15 PM Ernestyna <ernest...@gmail.com> wrote:

> yesterday i decided to implement a new module to our wiki called Line distributions. basically, it just shows a ranking of the group's members based on how much they sang in a song. it uses local groups with members to work properly where some of the members have a space in their name, e.g. "Kim Lip", "Go Won", or "Olivia Hye". it also uses another module,

I think that this is a terrible design. Members should not be modeled
by variables.

The names should be keys to tables, and must be kept as strings

Perhaps if you tell us more details about the task, we can give more
specific help!

[Frank Kastenholz]

You can not do something like

    Kim Lip = 123

However, you could say

  Some_datatable[“Kim Lip”] = 123

However, using a person’s name as a key may bit be the wisest choice. What happens if there are two people named “Kim Lip”?  

[Martin Eden]

On 2026-07-13 13:12, Pierpaolo BERNARDI wrote:
> On Mon, Jul 13, 2026 at 12:15 PM Ernestyna<ernest...@gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> yesterday i decided to implement a new module to our wiki called Line distributions. basically, it just shows a ranking of the group's members based on how much they sang in a song. it uses local groups with members to work properly where some of the members have a space in their name, e.g. "Kim Lip", "Go Won", or "Olivia Hye". it also uses another module,
> I think that this is a terrible design. Members should not be modeled
> by variables.

Second that. Code should have minimal dependency of data.

> Perhaps if you tell us more details about the task, we can give more
> specific help!

Actually OP provided link to code:

    https://loonatheworld.fandom.com/wiki/Module:LD

I'll refrain from advice here. ( I started my Lua journey
from World of Warcraft. There it seemed that doing
the job is more important than how it's done. )

-- Martin

[Ernestyna]

i'm grateful for everyone's answers! i'll try to explain the concept more so you can all understand better.

the Line distribution module acts as a way to rank the members of a group based on how many lines they sang (or rapped/talked) in a song. the amount of seconds and percentage is taken from an external video and entered into arguments when the module is invoked on a page.

for reference:

— singer is based on local groups

— image uses files from the wiki
— all non-standard names such as HeeJin or Olivia Hye are "members" [variables?] of the local groups, e.g. LOONA

i know the code is not pleasant to look at, and there are definitely better ways to write some parts...

continuing on! the module also uses another module called Index which acts as a color scheme(?) for the members

so when the ranking is shown, each member has their respective color attributed to them if the variable entered when invoking the Line distribution module is the same as in the Index module. and that is a problem because i cannot enter "Kim Lip" in the Index module, only "KimLip" or "Kim_Lip".

i think the best option would be to name the local groups' + Index's variables something different BUT make the output as original.

EXAMPLE:

Line distribution

local groups = {

     LOONA = { "HJ", "HN", "HS", "YJ", "VV", "KL", "JS", "CR", "YV", "CU", "GW," "OH" }

}

Index

return {

     HJ = { color = "blahblah", border = "blahblah" },

}

okay i'll stop writing for now so i can see what you guys think LOL

also, one quick question—what is a table?

[Ernestyna]

On Monday, July 13, 2026 at 2:43:46 PM UTC+2 Frank Kastenholz wrote:

What happens if there are two people named “Kim Lip”?  

i guess nothing! whenever there is a duplicate argument call in a template fandom ignores it and attributes a category to the page: Pages using duplicate arguments in template calls

[Pierpaolo BERNARDI]

OK. The misunderstandings are caused by your use of the word "variable".  What you call variable, actually is a string :)

For the original question: when you need to refer to Kim Lip, use "Kim Lip".

Try perusing this book: https://www.lua.org/pil/2.5.html

To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/lua-l/4a6168d5-a3f0-47de-81d7-861be86f509bn%40googlegroups.com.

[Jure Bagić]

> also, one quick question—what is a table?

It is a Lua value (an object) that offers key-value mapping and
associative arrays (a list, but ignore this for now).
What you call a group is actually a TABLE.
Here is a table:

> local t = { a = 5 }

Table definition begins with '{' and ends with corresponding '}',
anything inside of those braces are table elements.
The above table has a single key-value mapping (a single element),
the string "a" mapped to (or assigned) the integer VALUE 5.
This table VALUE is assigned to the (local) VARIABLE 't'.
So the following two lines:

> print(t.a)
> print(t["a"])

will print (the '> ' prefix is how I highlight code/output in email):

> 5
> 5

Now you can also do:

> local t = { "MyName" }

this is equivalent to:

> local t = { [1] = "MyName" }

where the integer VALUE 1 is mapped to the string VALUE "MyName".
(This table VALUE is once again assigned to the local VARIABLE 't'.)
So this:

> print(t[1])

will print the following string VALUE

> MyName

You will notice that you need to use index notation ('[' ']') as
opposed to dot access ('.') for non-string key values or strings
that do not form a valid name/identifier.
In other words the 't.bla' is syntax sugar for 't["bla"]'.

Finally, the 'local' keyword is put before the VARIABLE name,
it means the VARIABLE is only visible to the current
script/function/block/chunk
where this VARIABLE is declared.
If you want to access a VARIABLE (such as 't') outside of that
script/function/block/chunk (perhaps from a different script/file that
requires
or executes after that script) then you can omit 'local' from the
examples above

> t = { [1] = "MyName" }

The above is global VARIABLE named 't',
assigned the VALUE of a table that has a single
element (key-value pair). The key is the integer
VALUE 1 that is mapped to string VALUE "MyName".
Of course, the following would be equivalent to the above

> t = { "MyName" }

and

> t = { "MyName", "OtherName" }

is actually

> t = { [1] = "MyName", [2] = "OtherName" }

I don't know if you knew these things already but I just couldn't understand
your email well enough (confusing terminology).
Hopefully it helps a bit to solve your problem, check out Lua reference
manual
(do 'print(__VERSION)' to see which version of reference manual to use).

I suggest learning Lua a bit and learning to separate what is part of
core/standard
Lua and the platform (Fandom) that embeds (or uses in some way?) Lua.
(Keep in mind, the above terminology I used is not so precise, just a
few beginner
friendly lines of code/explanations.)

-- Jure

[Ernestyna]

thank you guys for all your help! i managed to make everything work by changing the code to this:

final result:

[Jure Bagić]

Congrats, BTW at the top of my reply I meant to say "dynamic arrays" not
"associative arrays".

-- Jure