strange error with mapcan and quote.

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stackman
Posts: 28
Joined: Sat Oct 06, 2012 5:44 am

strange error with mapcan and quote.

Post by stackman » Sat Oct 20, 2012 1:54 pm

I get a weird behavior with sbcl when I try the following code at the repl.

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 (mapcan (lambda (x) (if (evenp x) '(even))) (list 1 2 3 4))
Sbcl hangs at 100% CPU without returning an error.

Why do I get such a behavior?
Apparently, this is related to the quote '(even).
If I replace it by (list 'even), I get the expected answer (EVEN EVEN).

As far as I understand from the spec, the mapcan call should be equivalent to

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(apply #'nconc (mapcar (lambda (x) (if (evenp x) '(even))) (list 1 2 3 4)))
but then this code gives a heap exhaustion. I am puzzled.

Konfusius
Posts: 62
Joined: Fri Jun 10, 2011 6:38 am

Re: strange error with mapcan and quote.

Post by Konfusius » Sat Oct 20, 2012 2:06 pm

Mapcan operates destructively on the lists returned by the function. Because your function returns a literal list mapcan operates destructively on a literal object. The error will go away if you replace '(even) by (list 'even).

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