To sort out atoms first and then sublists from a list in LISP

Question

I have this homework in LISP where I need to sort out atoms and then sublists from a list. I\'m sure this is supposed to be easy task but as I\'m not much of a programmer th

Answer 1

Just in case you will want to exercise more, and you will find that the examples provided here are not enough :P

(defun sort-atoms-first-recursive (x &optional y)
  (cond
    ((null x) y)
    ((consp (car x))
     (sort-atoms-first-recursive (cdr x) (cons (car x) y)))
    (t (cons (car x) (sort-atoms-first-recursive (cdr x) y)))))

(defun sort-atoms-first-loop (x)
  (do ((a x (cdr a))
       (b) (c) (d) (e))
      (nil)
    (if (consp (car a))
      (if b (setf (cdr b) a b (cdr b)) (setf b a d a))
      (if c (setf (cdr c) a c (cdr c)) (setf c a e a)))
    (when (null (cdr a))
      (cond
        ((null d) (return e))
        ((null c) (return d))
        (t (setf (cdr b) nil (cdr c) d) (return e))))))


(sort-atoms-first-recursive '(5 -1 (2 6 1) (8 7 -3) (0 (9 4)) -6))

(sort-atoms-first-loop '(5 -1 (2 6 1) (8 7 -3) (0 (9 4)) -6))

The second one is destructive (but doesn't create any new conses).