Lua in the bootloader

[Jordan Hubbard]

> limitations that I battle in Forth are significant enough
> that I'd like to see if Lua can break said chains (such as
> "dictionary full" errors causing BTX halt -- induced simply
> by adding "too many functions" in Forth).

I'm not one to stand in the way of progress either, but just to make sure we are not foolishly conflating "language" with "environment" here:  You do all realize that ficl can have any sized dictionary you want, right?  Presumably, it's kept small due to the limitations of the boot loader environment, and Lua is not going to magically transcend those limitations.  Writing lots of boot code in Lua will require memory, perhaps even MORE memory since, say what you like about Forth, it's hard to get more concise or compact than a Forth dictionary of compiled CFA's.  That's why we picked it for the role in the first place. 

So anyway, first try expanding the size of the dictionary. If that can't be done, now you know your "ceiling" for Lua.  Can you stay below it, not just now but longer term?  Those are the questions you need to answer.

- Jordan