Tracking various stats on character development

The purpose of this code is to track player development on a Multi-User Dungeon I play. It allows saving multiple characters to the same database. It allows for updates on level, hour, tier, morts, months, years, weeks, and days.

Are there any improvements that could be made? Assume that any "missing" functions are functions I have elsewhere that have no real impact; this is the bulk of the code. Ultimately, I want to condense the code from the current 224 lines, if possible.

```
function report_type(rtype)
local reports = {["hour"] = "ThisHour", ["lasthour"] = "LastHour", ["today"] = "Today", ["yesterday"] = "Yesterday", ["tier"] = "ThisTier", ["lasttier"] = "LastTier", ["month"] = "ThisMonth", ["lastmonth"] = "LastMonth", ["year"] = "ThisYear", ["lastyear"] = "LastYear", ["mort"] = "ThisMort", ["lastmort"] = "LastMort", ["week"] = "ThisWeek", ["lastweek"] = "LastWeek"}
if rtype == "lastlevel" then
if trackerdb[charname]["HasPupped"] == 0 then
return report_info("LastLevel")
else
return report_info("LastLevel","Pup")
end
elseif rtype == "level" then
if trackerdb[charname]["HasPupped"] == 0 then
return report_info("ThisLevel")
else
return report_info("ThisLevel","Pup")
end
else
return report_info(reports[rtype])
end -- if
end -- function report_type

function QuestStart(t, r, a, c)

trackerdb[charname]["Quests"]["Report"] = "@x184{@x160On Quest@x184} @wKill @x160" .. t .. " @wLocation: @x160" .. r .. "@w in @x160" .. a .. "@w. Time to complete: @x160" .. c .. "@w minutes."
trackerdb[charname]["Timers"]["ThisQuest"]["Start"]=socket.gettime()
savetable()
return trackerdb[charname]["ReportChan"] .. " " .. trackerdb[charname]["Quests"]["Report"]
end

function QuestFail()
trackerdb[charname]["Quests"]["Report"] = "@x184{@x160Quest failed@x184}@w"
addto(trackerdb[charname]["Quests"]["Total"],"Failed")
savetable()
return trackerdb[charname]["ReportChan"] .. " " .. trackerdb[charnam

Starting with your first function: report_type. You don't need to put the table indices inside square brackets.

local reports = { hour = "ThisHour",  lasthour = "LastHour",  ... }

would work just as well. Instead of checking HasPupped in each of the if blocks, check it just once.

function report_type(rtype)
    local reports = {
        hour = "ThisHour", 
        lasthour = "LastHour", 
        today = "Today", 
        yesterday = "Yesterday", 
        tier = "ThisTier", 
        lasttier = "LastTier", 
        month = "ThisMonth", 
        lastmonth = "LastMonth", 
        year = "ThisYear", 
        lastyear = "LastYear", 
        mort = "ThisMort", 
        lastmort = "LastMort", 
        week = "ThisWeek", 
        lastweek = "LastWeek"
    }
    local bHasPup = ( trackerdb[charname]["HasPupped"] == 0 and "Pup" )
    if rtype == "lastlevel" then
        return report_info( "LastLevel", bHasPup )
    elseif rtype == "level" then
        return report_info( "ThisLevel", bHasPup )
    else
        return report_info(reports[rtype])
    end -- if
end -- function report_type

You can use os.difftime instead of computing your own time difference.

As for your addZero function, I think you can simply use a string.format call:

function addZero( n )
    return ("%02d"):format( n )
end

I'm still going through rest of the function definitions. I'll keep updating this post.

StackExchange Code Review Q#80534, answer score: 2