HedTB/ParallelLua

Module for efficient and easy use of Luau's early support for parallel processing.

ParallelLua

Simple and efficient way of taking advantage of Roblox's Parallel Lua.

Usage

1. Download the module or get it from the toolbox.
2. Place the module in ReplicatedStorage (make sure there exists an Actor and a ClientActor as children of the module).
3. Make sure your hierachy looks like this:

Pointer should be an ObjectValue, Function a BindableFunction, and Script a normal Script (in the ClientActor, it should be a LocalScript) with the following content:

local functions = require(script.Parent.Pointer.Value)

script.Parent.Function.OnInvoke = function(func, ...) 
	task.desynchronize()

	return functions[func](...)
end

3. Create a module script including all the executable functions. It can look like this:

return {
	Test = function(a, b)
		for i = 1, 1e6 do
			a, b = b, a
		end
		
		return a, b
	end,
}

4. Create a script, and type out the following:

local ParallelModule = require(path.to.module)(path.to.functions.module)

-- Create an array of parameters (Can be an array of tables as well)
local parameters = table.create(100, true) -- Just an example, you could put pretty anything here (as long as it's an array of parameters)

-- Returns an array of the returned results
local returnValues = ParallelModule("FunctionName", parameters)

print(returnValues)

5. Upon calling ParallelModule, the function will yield until all of the parameters have been processed. Internally, we're simply iterating through the array and executing the function using task.spawn().

Example Results

The output of an example run using the code below :

Here's the code that was used for the benchmark above:

local ParallelLua = require(ReplicatedStorage.ParallelLua)(ReplicatedStorage.Functions)

while true do
	-- SEQUENTIAL LUAU 
	
	local start = os.clock()
	
	for i = 1, 100 do
		local a, b = 0, 1
		
		for i = 1, 1e6 do
			a, b = b, a
		end
	end
	
	print("SEQ : ", os.clock() - start)
	
	-- PARALLEL LUAU
	
	local start = os.clock()
	local parameters = table.create(100, { 0, 1 })
	
	ParallelLua("Test", parameters)
	print("PARA : ", os.clock() - start)
	
	task.wait(1)
end