Removing duplicate strings in a list

[whdjr]

Can someone refresh my memory as to what function is used to remove duplicate strings from a list.

I'm having a brain fart this morning.

Thanks,
Will

[stig.madsen]

VL-REMOVE would probably be a good choice.

(vl-remove "hey" '("hey" "this" "is" "a" "bunch" "of" "heys"))
("this" "is" "a" "bunch" "of" "heys")

(vl-remove "heys" '("hey" "this" "is" "a" "bunch" "of" "heys"))
("hey" "this" "is" "a" "bunch" "of")

[whdjr]

stig,

Thanks for the response. That worked too well I'm afraid.
Let me clarify what I need. I need to delete all the duplicates except one.

list would be :
("hey" "this" "is" "hey" "a" "bunch" "hey" "of" "heys")

remove all "hey" duplicates:
("hey" "this" "is" "a" "bunch" "of" "heys")

Does that clarify it a bit?

Thanks,

[stig.madsen]

Hmmm, it clarifies but also makes it a bit more complex. How is the code supposed to know which item to keep? If the first match is to remain then perhaps something like this will do?

(defun removeAllButFirst (item lst / n ll)
(setq n (cdr (member item lst)))
(repeat (- (length lst) (length n))
(setq ll (cons (car lst) ll)
lst (cdr lst)))
(append (reverse ll) (vl-remove item n))
)

[whdjr]

I just want it remove all items that are the same except one of them. It doesn't matter which one of them.

Thanks,

[MarkTheSwampThomas]

I think you want this:

(vl-remove-if predicate-function list)

or:

(vl-remove-if-not predicate-function list)

[stig.madsen]

Ah, no need for order, only removing duplicates:

(defun removeDups (item lst / ll)
(foreach n lst
(cond ((equal n item)
(and (not (member item ll))
(setq ll (cons n ll))))
(T (setq ll (cons n ll)))))
(reverse ll)
)

Ok, so it keeps the first occurrence like the former :)

Mark, just being curious: which predicate function would you write for VL-REMOVE-IF to remove duplicates?

[whdjr]

Thanks stig I'll work that into my code and see how it works.