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Lisp - Interview Questions
What are its key features of Lisp?
Lisp is a programming language with several key features that distinguish it from other languages. Here are some of its notable features:

1. Homoiconicity : Lisp treats code and data interchangeably. Lisp programs are written in the same structure as Lisp data, allowing programs to be manipulated and transformed as data. This enables powerful metaprogramming capabilities and makes Lisp highly extensible.

2. Dynamic Typing : Lisp uses dynamic typing, allowing variables to be dynamically assigned to different data types at runtime. This flexibility allows for more expressive programming and makes it easier to write generic and reusable code.

3. Automatic Memory Management : Lisp provides automatic memory management through garbage collection. This relieves programmers from manual memory allocation and deallocation, making Lisp programs less prone to memory-related errors such as memory leaks and dangling pointers.

4. Functional Programming : Lisp has strong support for functional programming paradigms. Functions are first-class objects in Lisp, meaning they can be passed as arguments, returned as results, and stored in data structures. Lisp encourages the use of higher-order functions and emphasizes immutability and pure functions.

5. Macros : Lisp has powerful macro facilities that allow programmers to define their own language constructs and extend the language's syntax. Macros enable the creation of domain-specific languages (DSLs) and facilitate metaprogramming by providing the ability to transform and generate code at compile-time.

6. Interactive Development Environment : Lisp environments often provide a rich interactive development environment with features like a read-eval-print loop (REPL) and runtime code evaluation. This enables programmers to experiment, test, and modify code on-the-fly, promoting an iterative and exploratory style of development.

7. Symbolic Expressions : Lisp programs are represented as symbolic expressions, known as S-expressions, which are composed of lists and atoms. This uniformity simplifies the parsing and manipulation of code and data, and allows for easy implementation of Lisp interpreters and compilers.

8. Extensive Standard Library : Lisp implementations typically come with a large and comprehensive standard library that provides a wide range of built-in functions and utilities. This makes it easier to write Lisp programs without relying heavily on external libraries or frameworks.

These features contribute to Lisp's expressive power, flexibility, and suitability for tasks such as artificial intelligence, symbolic computation, and metaprogramming. Lisp's design philosophy emphasizes simplicity, abstraction, and the empowerment of programmers to create their own languages and tools.
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