What is self

[sturdy ruin]

What is self and why is it red

[high ginkgo]

https://create.roblox.com/docs/luau/metatables

[noble jolt]

self is just a variable name

its by default when you do methods to an object

local object = {name = "foo"}

function object:Hello()
  print(self.name) -- self here is the object
end

object:Hello()

[noble jolt]

;compile

[abstract bough]

Program Output

foo

paulogarithm#0000 | lua | lua-5.4.3 | wandbox.org

[noble jolt]

but its just a variable name so you can clearly do

local self = 3
print(self)

[noble jolt]

;compile

[abstract bough]

Program Output

3

paulogarithm#0000 | lua | lua-5.4.3 | wandbox.org

[thick ravine]

self is an automatic parameter assigned to a function with : which always refers to the object that the function was called, and it 99% of the time is a table as the person above me showed. A function is assigned as a key of the object:

object:Hello = function()

And self is automatically assigned as the first parameter for the : method, so the function above is the same as
object.Hello = function(self)

So self is the same as object. Usually made to work with Object Oriented Programming.