<cat>Dev.Lua</cat> no value is a type in Lua representing no data. While this mostly appears the same as <page>nil</page> from the Lua state, C functions will consider this distinct. This difference can be displayed from Lua with the <page>Global.type</page> function which, unlike [vanilla Lua's type function](https://www.lua.org/pil/2.html), will return `no value` when given no data. <example> <description>Examples of the difference:</description> <code> print( type() ) print( type( nil ) ) </code> <output><br/>no value<br/>nil</output> </example> In vanilla Lua 5.1-5.3, calling <page>Global.type</page>() will result in the error `bad argument #1 to 'type' (value expected)` instead of returning `no value`, making this property unique to GLua. Functions that return nothing technically return no value, making `return` and `return nil` unique statements. <example> <description>Examples of the difference:</description> <code> local function a() end -- Same as a local function b() return end -- Difference from a and b -- Different from a and b local function c() return nil end print( type( a() ) ) print( type( b() ) ) print( type( c() ) ) </code> <output><br/>no value<br/>no value<br/>nil</output> </example> Lua variables cannot hold no value and instead will default to <page>nil</page>. <example> <description>Example of this behaviour:</description> <code> local function a() end local d = a() print( type( d ) ) </code> <output>nil</output> </example> no value will be coerced to nil in value comparisons. <example> <description>Example of this behaviour:</description> <code> local function a() end print( a() == nil ) print( not a() ) </code> <output><br/>true<br/>true</output> </example>