LISP FROM NOTHING

Errata to the First Edition

This is a list of all factual mistakes that have been found in the first edition of LISP from Nothing. The list omits typos that do not distort the meaning of the text.

All of the below errata have been found by Patrick Clot. Thank you, Patrick!

Page 15

The arguments are swapped in the sample application of MAPCAR:

(MAPLIST (QUOTE CAR) (QUOTE (A B C)))

should be

(MAPLIST (QUOTE (A B C)) (QUOTE CAR))

Page 59

There is a misplaced right parenthesis in the following form.

(LABEL ((N (CONS (*CAR C)) NIL))

should be

(LABEL ((N (CONS (*CAR C) NIL)))

Page 176

The enumeration of functions and special forms should include the SETQ operator:

ATOM CAR CDR COND CONS EQ LABEL LAMBDA QUOTE SETQ

Pages 56,57 and 216,217

The INTERN function has linear time complexity and not quadratic time complexity. The correct formula would be O(nL/2) instead of O(n²/2), because the average length of symbols (L) does not grow over time.

The use of a bucket list still improves performance significantly.