Download ALisp User's Guide

Table of contents
1.
2.
3.
Introduction ......................................................................................................................... 4
Starting ALisp ..................................................................................................................... 4
Basic Primitives .................................................................................................................. 5
3.1. Data types........................................................................................................................ 6
3.2. Symbols........................................................................................................................... 6
3.2.1.
Defining functions .................................................................................................. 7
3.2.2.
Binding variables .................................................................................................... 8
3.2.3.
Symbol manipulation ............................................................................................ 10
3.3. Lists ............................................................................................................................... 11
3.3.1.
Destructive list functions ...................................................................................... 13
3.4. Strings ........................................................................................................................... 15
3.5. Numbers ........................................................................................................................ 16
3.6. Logical Functions.......................................................................................................... 17
3.7. Arrays ............................................................................................................................ 18
3.8. Hash Tables ................................................................................................................... 19
3.9. Main memory B-trees ................................................................................................... 20
3.10. Functional arguments and dynamic forms .................................................................... 21
3.10.1. Closures................................................................................................................. 22
3.10.2. Applying functions with variable arity ................................................................. 22
3.10.3. Dynamic evaluation .............................................................................................. 23
3.10.4. System functions for run-time evaluation ............................................................. 23
3.11. Map functions ............................................................................................................... 24
3.12. Control Structures ......................................................................................................... 25
3.12.1. Compound expressions ......................................................................................... 26
3.12.2. Conditional expressions ........................................................................................ 26
3.12.3. Iterative statements ............................................................................................... 27
3.12.4. Non-local returns .................................................................................................. 28
3.13. Macros........................................................................................................................... 28
3.14. Defining structures ........................................................................................................ 31
3.15. Miscellaneous functions................................................................................................ 32
3.16. Hooks ............................................................................................................................ 33
4.
Time Functions ................................................................................................................. 34
4.1. System clock ................................................................................................................. 34
4.2. Absolute Time Values................................................................................................... 35
4.3. Relative time values ...................................................................................................... 35
4.4. Relative Date Values..................................................................................................... 35
5.
Input and Output ............................................................................................................... 36
5.1. File I/O .......................................................................................................................... 38
5.2. Text streams .................................................................................................................. 39
5.3. Sockets .......................................................................................................................... 39
5.3.1.
Point to point communication ............................................................................... 40
5.3.2.
Remote evaluation ................................................................................................ 41
6.
Error handling ................................................................................................................... 42
6.1. Trapping exceptions ...................................................................................................... 42
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