1

About the Tutorial

LISP is the second-oldest high-level programming language after Fortran and has
changed a great deal since its early days, and a number of dialects have existed over
its history. Today, the most widely known general-purpose LISP dialects are Common
LISP and Scheme.

This tutorial takes you through features of LISP Programming language by simple and
practical approach of learning.

Audience
This reference has been prepared for the beginners to help them understand the basic
to advanced concepts related to LISP Programming language.

Prerequisites
Before you start doing practice with various types of examples given in this reference,
we assume that you are already aware of the fundamentals of computer programming
and programming languages.

Copyright & Disclaimer

 Copyright 2014 by Tutorials Point (I) Pvt. Ltd.

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 LISP

Table of Contents
About the Tutorial ............................................................................................................................................. i

Audience ........................................................................................................................................................... i

Prerequisites ..................................................................................................................................................... i

Copyright & Disclaimer...................................................................................................................................... i

Table of Contents ............................................................................................................................................. ii

1. OVERVIEW................................................................................................................................... 1

Features of Common LISP................................................................................................................................. 1

Applications Developed in LISP ........................................................................................................................ 1

2. ENVIRONMENT SETUP................................................................................................................. 3

How to Use CLISP ............................................................................................................................................. 3

3. PROGRAM STRUCTURE................................................................................................................ 4

A Simple LISP Program ..................................................................................................................................... 4

LISP Uses Prefix Notation ................................................................................................................................. 5

Evaluation of LISP Programs ............................................................................................................................. 5

The 'Hello World' Program ............................................................................................................................... 6

4. BASIC SYNTAX .............................................................................................................................. 7

Basic Elements in LISP ...................................................................................................................................... 7

Adding Comments ............................................................................................................................................ 8

Notable Points ................................................................................................................................................. 8

LISP Forms ........................................................................................................................................................ 8

Naming Conventions in LISP ............................................................................................................................. 9

Use of Single Quotation Mark .......................................................................................................................... 9

5. DATA TYPES ............................................................................................................................... 11

Type Specifiers in LISP .................................................................................................................................... 11

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 LISP

6. MACROS .................................................................................................................................... 14

Defining a Macro ............................................................................................................................................ 14

7. VARIABLES ................................................................................................................................. 15

Global Variables ............................................................................................................................................. 15

Local Variables ............................................................................................................................................... 16

8. CONSTANTS ............................................................................................................................... 18

9. OPERATORS ............................................................................................................................... 19

Arithmetic Operations.................................................................................................................................... 19

Comparison Operations ................................................................................................................................. 20

Logical Operations on Boolean Values............................................................................................................ 22

Bitwise Operations on Numbers..................................................................................................................... 24

10. DECISION MAKING..................................................................................................................... 27

The cond Construct in LISP ............................................................................................................................. 28

The if Construct .............................................................................................................................................. 29

The when Construct ....................................................................................................................................... 30

The case Construct ......................................................................................................................................... 31

11. LOOPS ....................................................................................................................................... 32

The loop Construct ......................................................................................................................................... 33

The loop for Construct .................................................................................................................................... 33

The do Construct ............................................................................................................................................ 35

The dotimes Construct ................................................................................................................................... 36

The dolist Construct ....................................................................................................................................... 37

Exiting Gracefully from a Block ....................................................................................................................... 38

12. FUNCTIONS ............................................................................................................................... 40

Defining Functions in LISP .............................................................................................................................. 40

Optional Parameters ...................................................................................................................................... 41

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 LISP

Rest Parameters ............................................................................................................................................. 42

Keyword Parameters ...................................................................................................................................... 43

Returning Values from a Function .................................................................................................................. 43

Lambda Functions .......................................................................................................................................... 45

Mapping Functions......................................................................................................................................... 45

13. PREDICATES ............................................................................................................................... 47

14. NUMBERS .................................................................................................................................. 51

Various Numeric Types in LISP ....................................................................................................................... 52

Number Functions .......................................................................................................................................... 53

15. CHARACTERS ............................................................................................................................. 56

Special Characters .......................................................................................................................................... 56

Character Comparison Functions .................................................................................................................... 57

16. ARRAYS ...................................................................................................................................... 59

17. STRINGS..................................................................................................................................... 66

String Comparison Functions .......................................................................................................................... 66

Case Controlling Functions ............................................................................................................................. 68

Trimming Strings ............................................................................................................................................ 69

Other String Functions ................................................................................................................................... 70

18. SEQUENCES ............................................................................................................................... 73

Creating a Sequence ....................................................................................................................................... 73

Generic Functions on Sequences .................................................................................................................... 73

Standard Sequence Function Keyword Arguments ......................................................................................... 76

Finding Length and Element ........................................................................................................................... 76

Modifying Sequences ..................................................................................................................................... 77

Sorting and Merging Sequences ..................................................................................................................... 78

Sequence Predicates ...................................................................................................................................... 79

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 LISP

Mapping Sequences ....................................................................................................................................... 80

19. LISTS .......................................................................................................................................... 81

The Cons Record Structure ............................................................................................................................. 81

Creating Lists with list Function in LISP ........................................................................................................... 82

List Manipulating Functions ........................................................................................................................... 83

Concatenation of car and cdr Functions ......................................................................................................... 85

20. SYMBOLS ................................................................................................................................... 86

Property Lists ................................................................................................................................................. 86

21. VECTORS ................................................................................................................................... 89

Creating Vectors ............................................................................................................................................. 89

Fill Pointer Argument ..................................................................................................................................... 90

22. SET ............................................................................................................................................ 92

Implementing Sets in LISP .............................................................................................................................. 92

Checking Membership .................................................................................................................................... 93

Set Union ....................................................................................................................................................... 94

Set Intersection .............................................................................................................................................. 95

Set Difference ................................................................................................................................................ 96

23. TREE .......................................................................................................................................... 98

Tree as List of Lists ......................................................................................................................................... 98

Tree Functions in LISP..................................................................................................................................... 98

Building Your Own Tree ................................................................................................................................100

Adding a Child Node into a Tree ....................................................................................................................100

24. HASH TABLE ............................................................................................................................ 103

Creating Hash Table in LISP ...........................................................................................................................103

Retrieving Items from Hash Table .................................................................................................................104

Adding Items into Hash Table ........................................................................................................................104

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Removing an Entry from Hash Table .............................................................................................................105

Applying a Specified Function on Hash Table ................................................................................................106

25. INPUT & OUTPUT .................................................................................................................... 107

Input Functions .............................................................................................................................................107

Reading Input from Keyboard .......................................................................................................................108

Output Functions ..........................................................................................................................................110

Formatted Output .........................................................................................................................................113

26. FILE I/O .................................................................................................................................... 115

Opening Files.................................................................................................................................................115

Writing to and Reading from Files .................................................................................................................116

Closing a File .................................................................................................................................................118

27. STRUCTURES ........................................................................................................................... 119

Defining a Structure ......................................................................................................................................119

28. PACKAGES ............................................................................................................................... 122

Package Functions in LISP ..............................................................................................................................122

Creating a Package ........................................................................................................................................123

Using a Package.............................................................................................................................................123

Deleting a Package ........................................................................................................................................125

29. ERROR HANDLING ................................................................................................................... 127

Signaling a Condition .....................................................................................................................................127

Handling a Condition .....................................................................................................................................127

Restarting or Continuing the Program Execution ...........................................................................................128

Error Signaling Functions in LISP ....................................................................................................................131

30. COMMON LISP OBJECT SYSTEMS ............................................................................................ 133

Defining Classes ............................................................................................................................................133

Providing Access and Read/Write Control to a Slot .......................................................................................133

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Creating Instance of a Class ...........................................................................................................................134

Defining a Class Method................................................................................................................................135

Inheritance ....................................................................................................................................................136

vii
 1. OVERVIEW LISP

LISP stands for LISt Programming. John McCarthy invented LISP in 1958, shortly
after the development of FORTRAN. It was first implemented by Steve Russell on an
IBM 704 computer. It is particularly suitable for Artificial Intelligence programs, as it
processes symbolic information efficiently.

Common LISP originated during the decade of 1980 to 1990, in an attempt to unify
the work of several implementation groups, as a successor of Maclisp like ZetaLisp
and New Implementation of LISP (NIL) etc.

It serves as a common language, which can be easily extended for specific

implementation. Programs written in Common LISP do not depend on machine-
specific characteristics, such as word length etc.

Features of Common LISP

 It is machine-independent

 It uses iterative design methodology

 It has easy extensibility

 It allows to update the programs dynamically

 It provides high level debugging.

 It provides advanced object-oriented programming.

 It provides convenient macro system.

 It provides wide-ranging data types like, objects, structures, lists, vectors,

adjustable arrays, hash-tables, and symbols.

 It is expression-based.

 It provides an object-oriented condition system.

 It provides complete I/O library.

 It provides extensive control structures.

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Applications Developed in LISP

The following applications are developed in LISP: Large successful applications built
in LISP.

 Emacs: It is a cross platform editor with the features of extensibility,

customizability, self-document ability, and real-time display.

 G2

 AutoCad

 Igor Engraver

 Yahoo Store

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 2. ENVIRONMENT SETUP LISP

CLISP is the GNU Common LISP multi-architechtural compiler used for setting up
LISP in Windows. The Windows version emulates Unix environment using MingW
under Windows. The installer takes care of this and automatically adds CLISP to the
Windows PATH variable.

You can get the latest CLISP for Windows at:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/clisp/files/latest/download

It creates a shortcut in the Start Menu by default, for the line-by-line interpreter.

How to Use CLISP

During installation, CLISP is automatically added to your PATH variable if you select
the option (RECOMMENDED). It means that you can simply open a new Command
window and type "clisp" to bring up the compiler.

To run a *.lisp or *.lsp file, simply use:

clisp hello.lisp

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 3. PROGRAM STRUCTURE LISP

LISP expressions are called symbolic expressions or S-expressions. The S-

expressions are composed of three valid objects:

 Atoms

 Lists

 Strings

Any S-expression is a valid program. LISP programs run either on an interpreter or

as compiled code.

The interpreter checks the source code in a repeated loop, which is also called the
Read-Evaluate-Print Loop (REPL). It reads the program code, evaluates it, and prints
the values returned by the program.

A Simple LISP Program

Let us write an s-expression to find the sum of three numbers 7, 9 and 11. To do
this, we can type at the interpreter prompt ->:

(+7911)

LISP returns the following result:

27

If you would like to execute the same program as a compiled code, then create a
LISP source code file named myprog.lisp and type the following code in it:

(write(+7911))

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result is:

27

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 LISP

LISP Uses Prefix Notation

In prefix notation, operators are written before their operands. You might have noted
that LISP uses prefix notation. In the above program, the ‘+’ symbol works as a
function name for the process of summation of the numbers.

For example, the following expression,

a * ( b + c ) / d

is written in LISP as:

(/ (* a (+ b c) ) d)

Let us take another example. Let us write code for converting Fahrenheit temperature
of 60o F to the centigrade scale:

The mathematical expression for this conversion is:

(60 * 9 / 5) + 32

Create a source code file named main.lisp and type the following code in it:

(write(+ (* (/ 9 5) 60) 32))

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, MATLAB executes it immediately
and the result is:

140

Evaluation of LISP Programs

The LISP program has two parts:

 Translation of program text into LISP objects by a reader program.

 Implementation of the semantics of the language in terms of LSIP objects by

an evaluator program.

The evaluation program takes the following steps:

 The reader translates the strings of characters to LISP objects or s-

expressions.

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 LISP

 The evaluator defines syntax of LISP forms that are built from s-expressions.

 This second level of evaluation defines a syntax that determines which s-

expressions are LISP forms.

 The evaluator works as a function that takes a valid LISP form as an argument
and returns a value. This is the reason why we put the LISP expression in
parenthesis, because we are sending the entire expression/form to the
evaluator as argument.

The 'Hello World' Program

Learning a new programming language does not really take off until you learn how
to greet the entire world in that language, right ?

Let us create new source code file named main.lisp and type the following code in it:

(write-line "Hello World")

(write-line "I am at 'Tutorials Point'! Learning LISP")

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result is:

Hello World
I am at 'Tutorials Point'! Learning LISP

13
 4. BASIC SYNTAX LISP

This chapter introduces you to basic syntax structure in LISP.

Basic Elements in LISP

LISP programs are made up of three basic elements:

 atom

 list

 string

An atom is a number or string of contiguous characters. It includes numbers and

special characters. The following examples show some valid atoms:

hello-from-tutorials-point
name
123008907
*hello*
Block#221
abc123

A list is a sequence of atoms and/or other lists enclosed in parentheses. The following
examples show some valid lists:

( i am a list)
(a ( a b c) d e fgh)
(father tom ( susan bill joe))
(sun mon tue wed thur fri sat)
( )

A string is a group of characters enclosed in double quotation marks. The following

examples show some valid strings:

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 LISP

" I am a string"
"a ba c d efg #$%^&!"
"Please enter the following details:"
"Hello from 'Tutorials Point'! "

Adding Comments
The semicolon symbol (;) is used for indicating a comment line.

Example

(write-line "Hello World") ; greet the world

; tell them your whereabouts
(write-line "I am at 'Tutorials Point'! Learning LISP")

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result returned is:

Hello World
I am at 'Tutorials Point'! Learning LISP

Notable Points
The following important points are notable:

 The basic numeric operations in LISP are +, -, *, and /

 LISP represents a function call f(x) as (f x), for example cos(45) is written as
cos 45

 LISP expressions are not case-sensitive. Means, cos 45 or COS 45 are same.

 LISP tries to evaluate everything, including the arguments of a function. Only

three types of elements are constants and always return their own value:

o Numbers

o The letter t, that stands for logical true

o The value nil, that stands for logical false, as well as an empty list.

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 LISP

LISP Forms
In the previous chapter, we mentioned that the evaluation process of LISP code takes
the following steps:

 The reader translates the strings of characters to LISP objects or s-

expressions.

 The evaluator defines syntax of LISP forms that are built from s-expressions.
This second level of evaluation defines a syntax that determines which s-
expressions are LISP forms.

A LISP form can be:

 An atom

 An empty list or non-list

 Any list that has a symbol as its first element

The evaluator works as a function that takes a valid LISP form as an argument and
returns a value. This is the reason why we put the LISP expression in
parenthesis, because we are sending the entire expression/form to the evaluator as
argument.

Naming Conventions in LISP

Name or symbols can consist of any number of alphanumeric characters other than
whitespace, open and closing parentheses, double and single quotes, backslash,
comma, colon, semicolon and vertical bar. To use these characters in a name, you
need to use escape character (\).

A name can have digits but must not be made of only digits, because then it would
be read as a number. Similarly a name can have periods, but cannot be entirely made
of periods.

Use of Single Quotation Mark

LISP evaluates everything including the function arguments and list members.

At times, we need to take atoms or lists literally and do not want them evaluated or
treated as function calls. To do this, we need to precede the atom or the list with a
single quotation mark.

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 LISP

The following example demonstrates this:

Create a file named main.lisp and type the following code into it:

(write-line "single quote used, it inhibits evaluation")

(write '(* 2 3))
(write-line " ")
(write-line "single quote not used, so expression evaluated")
(write (* 2 3))

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result is:

single quote used, it inhibits evaluation

(* 2 3)
single quote not used, so expression evaluated
6

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 5. DATA TYPES LISP

LISP data types can be categorized as:

Scalar types - numbers, characters, symbols etc.

Data structures - lists, vectors, bit-vectors, and strings.

Any variable can take any LISP object as its value, unless you declare it explicitly.
Although, it is not necessary to specify a data type for a LISP variable, however, it
helps in certain loop expansions, in method declarations and some other situations
that we will discuss in later chapters.

The data types are arranged into a hierarchy. A data type is a set of LISP objects and
many objects may belong to one such set.

The typep predicate is used for finding whether an object belongs to a specific type.

The type-of function returns the data type of a given object.

Type Specifiers in LISP

Type specifiers are system-defined symbols for data types.

Array fixnum package simple-string

Atom float pathname simple-vector

Bignum function random-state single-float

Bit hash-table Ratio standard-char

bit-vector integer Rational stream

Character keyword readtable string

[common] list sequence [string-char]

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compiled-function long-float short-float symbol

Complex nill signed-byte t

Cons null simple-array unsigned-byte

double-float number simple-bit-vector vector

Apart from these system-defined types, you can create your own data types. When
a structure type is defined using defstruct function, the name of the structure type
becomes a valid type symbol.>/p>

Example 1

Create new source code file named main.lisp and type the following code in it:

(setq x 10)
(setq y 34.567)
(setq ch nil)
(setq n 123.78)
(setq bg 11.0e+4)
(setq r 124/2)
(print x)
(print y)
(print n)
(print ch)
(print bg)
(print r)

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result returned is:

10
34.567
123.78
NIL
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 LISP

110000.0
62

Example 2

Next let us check the types of the variables used in the previous example. Create
new source code file named main.lisp and type the following code in it:

(setq x 10)
(setq y 34.567)
(setq ch nil)
(setq n 123.78)
(setq bg 11.0e+4)
(setq r 124/2)
(print (type-of x))
(print (type-of y))
(print (type-of n))
(print (type-of ch))
(print (type-of bg))
(print (type-of r))

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result is:

(INTEGER 0 281474976710655)
SINGLE-FLOAT
SINGLE-FLOAT
NULL
SINGLE-FLOAT
(INTEGER 0 281474976710655)

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LISP

21
 6. MACROS LISP

This chapter introduces you about macros in LISP.

A macro is a function that takes an s-expression as arguments and returns a LISP

form, which is then evaluated. Macros allow you to extend the syntax of standard
LISP.

Defining a Macro
In LISP, a named macro is defined using another macro named defmacro. Syntax
for defining a macro is:

(defmacro macro-name (parameter-list)

"Optional documentation string."
body-form)

The macro definition consists of the name of the macro, a parameter list, an optional
documentation string, and a body of LISP expressions that defines the job to be
performed by the macro.

Example

Let us write a simple macro named setTo10, which takes a number and sets its value
to 10.

Create new source code file named main.lisp and type the following code in it:

defmacro setTo10(num)
(setq num 10)(print num))
(setq x 25)
(print x)
(setTo10 x)

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result is:

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 LISP

25
10

23
 7. VARIABLES LISP

In LISP, each variable is represented by a symbol. The name of the variable is the
name of the symbol and it is stored in the storage cell of the symbol.

Global Variables
Global variables are generally declared using the defvar construct. Global variables
have permanent values throughout the LISP system and remain in effect until new
values are specified.

Example

(defvar x 234)
(write x)

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result is:

234

As there is no type declaration for variables in LISP, you need to specify a value for
a symbol directly with the setq construct.

Example

->(setq x 10)

The above expression assigns the value 10 to the variable x. You can refer to the
variable using the symbol itself as an expression.

The symbol-value function allows you to extract the value stored at the symbol
storage place.

Example

Create new source code file named main.lisp and type the following code in it:

(setq x 10)
(setq y 20)
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 LISP

(format t "x = ~2d y = ~2d ~%" x y)

(setq x 100)
(setq y 200)
(format t "x = ~2d y = ~2d" x y)

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result is:

x = 10 y = 20
x = 100 y = 200

Local Variables
Local variables are defined within a given procedure. The parameters named as
arguments within a function definition are also local variables. Local variables are
accessible only within the respective function.

Like the global variables, local variables can also be created using the setq construct.

There are two other constructs - let and prog for creating local variables.

The let construct has the following syntax:

(let ((var1 val1) (var2 val2).. (varn valn))<s-expressions>)

Where var1, var2,…,varn are variable names and val1, val2,…, valn are the initial
values assigned to the respective variables.

When let is executed, each variable is assigned the respective value and at last, the s-
expression is evaluated. The value of the last expression evaluated is returned.

If you do not include an initial value for a variable, the variable is assigned to nil.

Example

Create new source code file named main.lisp and type the following code in it:

(let ((x 'a)

(y 'b)
(z 'c))
(format t "x = ~a y = ~a z = ~a" x y z))

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 LISP

When you click the Execute button, or type Ctrl+E, LISP executes it immediately and
the result is:

x = A y = B z = C

The prog construct also has the list of local variables as its first argument, which is
followed by the body of the prog, and any number of s-expressions.

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 LISP

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