elegant way to count items

Question

I have a list shaped like this:

  \'((\"Alpha\" .  1538)
    (\"Beta\"  .  8036)
    (\"Gamma\" .  8990)
    (\"Beta\"  .  10052)
    (\"Alpha\" .  12837)
           


        

Answer 1

I dunno that this is the most elegant, but it seems reasonable:

(defun add-for-cheeso (data)
  (let (result)
    (dolist (elt data result)
      (let ((sofar (assoc (car elt) result)))
        (if sofar
            (setcdr sofar (1+ (cdr sofar)))
          (push (cons (car elt) 1) result))))))