Print statement not executing within ipairs loop

Question

I have the following table defined which consists of tables defined under a string index as such:

local myTable = {
    ["str-1"] = {
        id = 1,
        value = "val"
    },

    ["str-2"] = {
        id = 2,
        value = "val",
    },

    ["str-3"] = {
        id = 3,
        value = "val",
    }
}

for i, table in ipairs(myTable) do
    print(i)
    print(table)
end

I'm attempting to loop through the contents of the table however the print() statements are not giving an output? I have placed a print statement to print both the current index of the loop and the table at that position.

Answer 1

This is because you are attempting to use an ipairs() loop over an associative array.

Instead, you can use a pairs() loop which supports iteration where the index of a table is associative:

for i, table in pairs(myTable) do
    print(i)
    print(table)
end

A pairs() loop uses a key-value pair and works with associative tables, this also results in iteration not being conducted in order whereas an ipairs() uses an index-value pair, the likes of which can be used on a regular table defined with numerical indexes.