# cons

Pronunciation: say "KONZ" US /ˈkɑnz/, UK /kɒnz/

## Noun

1. Plural of con. — plural of con
   - Simple: Plural of con. Use it when there is more than one.
   - _She flies to three or four comic cons every summer to sell her artwork._
   - _Both cons cost retirees thousands of dollars before the police caught on._
3. In Lisp, a data structure made of a pair of pointers, called car and cdr, used mainly to build lists.
   - Simple: In the computer language Lisp, a small unit holding two links, used mostly to build lists.
   - _A three-element list is built from three conses chained through their cdr fields._
   - _Calling car on a cons returns its first half._

## Verb

2. Third-person singular simple present of con. — third-person singular simple present indicative of con
   - Simple: Third-person singular simple present of con. Use it after he, she or it.
   - _The pilot cons the ship through the narrow harbor entrance._
   - _Every night she cons the script until she knows each line by heart._
4. To put an element at the front of a list by forming a cons of the element and the list, or to build up a list from conses by repeating the step.
   - Simple: In programming, to add an item to the front of a list, or build a list by doing that many times.
   - _To add the new node, we cons it onto the front of the existing list._
   - _Each recursive call conses one more element onto the result._

## Origin

A shortened form (clipping) of construct.

Source: DictionaryAI, https://dictionaryai.com/define/cons (written from Wiktionary data, CC BY-SA 4.0: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/).