Is there a better way?

[Sweetsour]

I have a curiosty I wanted to shed light on. I was curious if there's any point, or if it's worth it, to setup variables like so:

"Normal" method

addon.MainFrame = CreateFrame("Frame","MainFrame",UIParent);
 
-- Like This
addon.MainFrame.MyLabel = CreateFrame("Frame",nil,addon.MainFrame);
addon.MainFrame.MyLabel.Text = addon.MainFrame.MyLabel:CreateFontString(nil,"BACKGROUND","GameFontNormal");
-- Or Like This
addon.MyLabel = CreateFrame("Frame",nil,addon.MainFrame);
addon.MyLabel.Text = addon.MyLabel:CreateFontString(nil,"BACKGROUND","GameFontNormal");

What about making a new [local] table to house frame elements?

local main = {};
main = addon.MainFrame;
 
main.MyLbl = CreateFrame("Frame",nil,main,"InputBoxTemplate");
main.MyLblText = main.MyLbl:CreateFontString(nil,"BACKGROUND","GameFontNormal");
-- ... etc

I guess what I'm really asking is; is there extra ways to optmize variables? Also, does the length of variable names (ie. "addon.MainFrame.MyLabel.Text" vs "main.MyLblText") affect overall addon performance?

[Duugu]

According to http://www.lua.org/gems/sample.pdf locals are faster than globals. Thus the second version should be faster.
Is it worth it? Depends on what you're doing. Probably not.

Regarding your second question: as every table lookup needs time I would guess that nested tables are slower.

[Sweetsour]

Thanks for the info and link!

[Seerah]

I do something like this sometimes:

local myFrame = CreateFrame("Frame", nil, UIParent)  --this frame has no global name, only a local reference
myFrame.label = myFrame:CreateFontString(......)

Then, if that child will be accessed more than once, I'll assign it to a local variable for faster lookups.

local myLabel = myFrame.label
myLabel:SetPoint("CENTER")
myLabel:SetText("Some text.")

[Phanx]

Originally Posted by Sweetsour local main = {}; main = addon.MainFrame;

Also this is kind of silly -- if you want "main" to be a reference to "addon.MainFrame" just set it as one directly, without creating and immediately discarding a random table in between:

local main = addon.MainFrame;

[Sweetsour]

Thanks guys, this really helps

[Sweetsour]

Had another quick question with this code:

-- File A
addon.FunctionInFileB(myVariable)
 
-- File B
function addon.FunctionInFileB(var)
     -- Various code
end

Is "var" in File B's function considered global, or local?

EDIT: Based on what I've found via google, it seems they are local (which I had figured). If this is incorrect, please say so

[Lombra]

Yeah, it is local to the function, in exactly the same way as it would be had you done this:

function addon.FunctionInFileB()
     local var
end

[Seerah]

Originally Posted by Lombra Yeah, it is local to the function, in exactly the same way as it would be had you done this: function addon.FunctionInFileB() local var end

... Teeeechnically, yes... Except in Sweetsour's code, var would have the value myVariable passed to it, whereas in your code, var is nil.

[Sweetsour]

So based on what I've leared from all this, I would assume Method A is better than Method B?

Method A

-- Initial Frame Setup
    addon.CallBtn = CreateFrame("Button",nil,self); -- Used globablly across addon files
    local CallBtn = addon.CallBtn;
    CallBtn:SetNormalTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Up");
    CallBtn:SetHighlightTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Highlight");
    CallBtn:SetPushedTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Down");
    CallBtn:SetDisabledTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Down");
    CallBtn:SetWidth(50);
    CallBtn:SetHeight(50);
    CallBtn:SetPoint("TOP",0,-27);
    CallBtn:Disable();
    CallBtn:SetAlpha(0.4);

Method B

-- Initial Frame Setup
    addon.CallBtn = CreateFrame("Button",nil,self); -- Used globablly across addon files
    addon.CallBtn:SetNormalTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Up");
    addon.CallBtn:SetHighlightTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Highlight");
    addon.CallBtn:SetPushedTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Down");
    addon.CallBtn:SetDisabledTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Down");
    addon.CallBtn:SetWidth(50);
    addon.CallBtn:SetHeight(50);
    addon.CallBtn:SetPoint("TOP",0,-27);
    addon.CallBtn:Disable();
    addon.CallBtn:SetAlpha(0.4);

[SDPhantom]

Technically yes, but when you're going through your init process, CPU power spent isn't as critical. The only time passing a value to a local makes a real difference is in code that is meant to run often. Examples of these are OnUpdate scripts and CombatLog events.

[Seerah]

Still good habits to get into, nonetheless.

[SDPhantom]

I'm just imagining how cluttered the local namespace would get in really big projects if everyone started doing this with init code. I honestly don't want to be the one to debug code like that.

Occasionally, if I don't need a reference back to the UI object I'm creating, I do something like this.
Note: This is only an example.

do
    local CallBtn = CreateFrame("Button",nil,self);
    CallBtn:SetNormalTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Up");
    CallBtn:SetHighlightTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Highlight");
    CallBtn:SetPushedTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Down");
    CallBtn:SetDisabledTexture("Interface\\Buttons\\UI-GroupLoot-Dice-Down");
    CallBtn:SetWidth(50);
    CallBtn:SetHeight(50);
    CallBtn:SetPoint("TOP",0,-27);
    CallBtn:Disable();
    CallBtn:SetAlpha(0.4);
end

The do...end block forces a lexical scope to be defined inside it. After the block is done executing, all locals defined inside it are freed.

[Seerah]

And if this

MyAddon.frame = CreateFrame("Frame")
local frame = MyAddon.frame

were done inside of a function or other block, then it's scope would be limited to that block. Just like what you just wrote.