Implement inheritable metamethods without stubs

In __newindex metamethods of each Class detect if
a metamethod is assigned. In that case, propogate assignment
to all child classes that do not overwrite the metamethod.
Track set of metamethods each class defines itself.
On subclassing, copy all parent metamethods to child.

Benefits of this approach:

* Objects only have metamethods when they are, in fact, defined.
  Ignoring overhead, the problem with stubs is that other libraries,
  seeing a stub metamethod, could try to call it and get an error
  if it's missing in the class. E.g. various deep comparison functions
  often try to detect and use __eq.
* Non-function metafields such as __metatable can be used.
* Less overhead when using metamethods (but more when defining them).

middleclass.lua

@@ -42,17 +42,51 @@ local function _setClassDictionariesMetatables(aClass)
   end
 end
 
+local all_metamethods_list = { '__add', '__band', '__bor', '__bxor', '__bnot', '__call', '__concat',
+                               '__div', '__eq', '__ipairs', '__idiv', '__le', '__len', '__lt', '__mod',
+                               '__mul', '__pairs', '__pow', '__shl', '__shr', '__sub', '__tostring', '__unm' }
+
+local all_metamethods = {}
+
+for _, metamethod in ipairs(all_metamethods_list) do
+  all_metamethods[metamethod] = true
+end
+
+local function _propogateMetamethod(aClass, key, value)
+  for subclass in pairs(aClass.subclasses) do
+    if not subclass.__metamethods[key] then
+      subclass.__instanceDict[key] = value
+      _propogateMetamethod(subclass, key, value)
+    end
+  end
+end
+
+local function _updateClassDict(aClass, key, value)
+  if all_metamethods[key] then
+    if value == nil then
+      aClass.__metamethods[key] = nil
+      value = aClass.super and aClass.super.__instanceDict[key]
+    else
+      aClass.__metamethods[key] = true
+    end
+
+    _propogateMetamethod(aClass, key, value)
+  end
+
+  aClass.__instanceDict[key] = value
+end
+
 local function _setClassMetatable(aClass)
   setmetatable(aClass, {
     __tostring = function() return "class " .. aClass.name end,
     __index    = aClass.static,
-    __newindex = aClass.__instanceDict,
+    __newindex = _updateClassDict,
     __call     = function(self, ...) return self:new(...) end
   })
 end
 
 local function _createClass(name, super)
-  local aClass = { name = name, super = super, static = {}, __mixins = {}, __instanceDict={} }
+  local aClass = { name = name, super = super, static = {}, __mixins = {}, __instanceDict = {}, __metamethods = {} }
   aClass.subclasses = setmetatable({}, {__mode = "k"})
 
   _setClassDictionariesMetatables(aClass)
@@ -61,17 +95,9 @@ local function _createClass(name, super)
   return aClass
 end
 
-local function _createLookupMetamethod(aClass, name)
+local function _setSubclassMetamethods(aClass, subclass)
-  return function(...)
+  for m in pairs(aClass.__metamethods) do
-    local method = aClass.super[name]
+    subclass.__instanceDict[m] = aClass.__instanceDict[m]
-    assert( type(method)=='function', tostring(aClass) .. " doesn't implement metamethod '" .. name .. "'" )
-    return method(...)
-  end
-end
-
-local function _setClassMetamethods(aClass)
-  for _,m in ipairs(aClass.__metamethods) do
-    aClass[m]= _createLookupMetamethod(aClass, m)
   end
 end
 
@@ -97,10 +123,6 @@ end
 
 local Object = _createClass("Object", nil)
 
-Object.static.__metamethods = { '__add', '__band', '__bor', '__bxor', '__bnot', '__call', '__concat',
-                                '__div', '__eq', '__ipairs', '__idiv', '__le', '__len', '__lt', '__mod',
-                                '__mul', '__pairs', '__pow', '__shl', '__shr', '__sub', '__tostring', '__unm' }
-
 function Object.static:allocate()
   assert(type(self) == 'table', "Make sure that you are using 'Class:allocate' instead of 'Class.allocate'")
   return setmetatable({ class = self }, self.__instanceDict)
@@ -117,7 +139,7 @@ function Object.static:subclass(name)
   assert(type(name) == "string", "You must provide a name(string) for your class")
 
   local subclass = _createClass(name, self)
-  _setClassMetamethods(subclass)
+  _setSubclassMetamethods(self, subclass)
   _setDefaultInitializeMethod(subclass, self)
   self.subclasses[subclass] = true
   self:subclassed(subclass)

spec/metamethods_spec.lua

@@ -171,7 +171,6 @@ describe('Metamethods', function()
 
     describe('An instance', function()
       it('has a tostring metamethod, returning a different result from Object.__tostring', function()
-        assert.not_equal(Peter.__tostring, Object.__tostring)
         assert.equal(tostring(peter), 'instance of class Peter')
       end)
     end)