How Clojure Hashmaps Work

A hashmap is a collection that maps keys to values. They have various names in other languages; Python refers to them as dictionaries, and JavaScript’s objects essentially work like hashmaps.

A hashmap can, like many collections, be constructed in two ways. There is the constructor function:

;; Note that each argument is *prepended* to the hashmap, not appended.
(def a-hashmap (hash-map :a 1 :b 2 :c 3))
a-hashmap
; => {:c 3, :b 2, :a 1}

You can also define them using a hashmap literal. This is often more concise and clear. Using commas to separate key/value pairs in hashmaps is recommended, as it can make the boundaries more clear.

;; This hashmap is actually in the right order, unlike the one above.
(def another-hashmap {:a 1, :b 2, :c 3})
another-hashmap
; => {:a 1, :b 2, :c 3}

Keywords and retrieving values from hashmaps

Hold up. What is this? :a ? :b ? :c ? Those look odd. Those, you see, are keywords. They’re called key -words because they’re often used as keys in hashmaps.

Why are they often used as keys? Well, unlike strings, keywords can be used as functions to extract values from a hashmap; no need for get or nth !

(def string-hashmap {"a" 1, "b" 2, "c" 3})
("a" string-hashmap)
; => ClassCastException java.lang.String cannot be cast to clojure.lang.IFn

(def keyword-hashmap {:a 1, :b 2, :c 3})
(:a keyword-hashmap)
; => 1

;; You can also pass a keyword a default value in case it's not found, just like get.
(:not-in-the-hashmap keyword-hashmap "not found!")
; => "not found!"

Converting other collections to hashmaps

Converting to a hashmap is tricky. To demonstrate, let’s try using it like vec or seq .

(hash-map [:a 1 :b 2 :c 3])
; => IllegalArgumentException No value supplied for key: [:a 1 :b 2 :c 3]

The hash-map function thinks that we’re trying to create a hashmap with [:a 1 :b 2 :c 3] as one of the keys. Watch what happens if we give it the right number of arguments:

(hash-map [:a 1 :b 2 :c 3] "foo")
; => {[:a 1 :b 2 :c 3] "foo"}

To convert a sequence to a hashmap, you’ll need to use and understand apply . Luckily, this is pretty simple: apply essentially destructures a collection before applying a function to it.

;; These two expressions are exactly the same.
(+ 1 2 3)
; => 6
(apply + [1 2 3])
; => 6

This is how you would convert a vector to a hashmap:

(apply hash-map [:a 1 :b 2 :c 3])
; => {:c 3, :b 2, :a 1}

;; This is the same as:
(hash-map :a 1 :b 2 :c 3)
; => {:c 3, :b 2, :a 1}

:rocket: IDEOne it!

Update a hashmap

You can update values inside a hashmap using assoc . This allows you to append new key/value pairs or change old ones.

(def outdated-hashmap {:a 1, :b 2, :c 3})

(def newer-hashmap (assoc outdated-hashmap :d 4))
newer-hashmap
; => {:a 1, :b 2, :c 3, :d 4}

(def newest-hashmap (assoc newer-hashmap :a 22))
newest-hashmap
; => {:a 22, :b 2, :c 3, :d 4}

;; Note that outdated-hashmap has not been mutated by any of this.
;; Assoc is pure and functional.
outdated-hashmap
; => {:a 1, :b 2, :c 3}

When to use a hashmap?

A hashmap is useful when you want to give names to your variables. If you’re ever thinking to yourself, “What if I used an object…” before you snap out of it and realise you’re using Clojure, try using a hashmap.

They are also useful if you want to associate two different values with each other. Take, for example, a ROT13 cipher: you could associate \A with \N , \B with \M , etc. (This would be long and boring to write in most languages, but Clojure has some functions that can generate it for you and make it fun! )