Intelligent sorting: NEW WINNER Dick Kriesel

[Dick Kriesel]

Thanks, Hugh.  In case anyone wants to see the sample data, here it is:

a 10 a 10 a 10
a 10 a 10 a 9
a 10 a 10 a
a 10 a 9 a
a 10 a 10
a 10 a 9
a 10 a
a 9 a
a 10
a 9
a
10
9
a10a10a10
a10a10a9
a10a10a
a10a9a
a10a10
a10a9
a10a
a9a
a10
a9

And here it is after sorting:

9
10
a
a9
a9a
a10
a10a
a10a9
a10a9a
a10a10
a10a10a
a10a10a9
a10a10a10
a 9
a 9 a
a 10
a 10 a
a 10 a 9
a 10 a 9 a
a 10 a 10
a 10 a 10 a
a 10 a 10 a 9
a 10 a 10 a 10

Incidentally, the "sortMe" function Hugh posted is not part of the solution;
it's just a demonstration of one way to use the solution.

-- Dick


On 7/8/10 1:45 PM, "FlexibleLearning" <admin at FlexibleLearning.com> wrote:

> This solution from Dick Kriesel is more accurate than any other solution so
> far (to an unliminted depth for all practical purposes) and its speed is
> comparable with the best to date. Yes it is long, but the demands for an
> accurate intelligent sort require some heavy duty parsing. Breaking each
> lines into sub-components is indeed the way to go, optimised by 'for each'.
> The solution is clearly annotated and sorting by the parallel array keys of
> each line is, in my view, a stroke of genius. The only, and quite
> understandable, limitation that I can determine is special-formatted
> sub-components such as dateTime, but within the parameters of the sample
> data expectations it excels. Well done, Dick.
> 
> Save this somewhere like the Scripter's Scrapbook for when you need it. As
> always, watch out for line-wraps...
> 
> function sortMe tData
>   sort_a1a tData
>   return tData
> end sortMe
> 
> command sort_a1a @tData, tSortDelimiter, tOrigin -- note: sort tData
> respecting chunks of digits
>   --| By Dick Kriesel [dick.kriesel at mail.com]
>   local tCharPrev, tDigits, tNonDigits, tSortKey, tSortKeys
>   if tSortDelimiter is empty then
>     put numToChar(8) into tSortDelimiter
>   end if
>   if tOrigin is empty then
>     put 1000000 into tOrigin
>     -- note: tOrigin = 1000000 enables alphabetic sorting for positive
> integers up to 9,999,999
>     -- note: the caller can enable sorting larger numbers, or can reduce the
> number of characters that will be sorted
>   end if
> 
>   /*
>   Step through tData, separating chunks of digits from chunks of other
> characters.
>   For each character that's an integer, append it to a variable that holds
> only digits.
>   For each character that's not an integer, append it to a variable that
> holds no digits.
>   When a character is an integer, but the previous character wasn't, append
> the string of
>   non-digits to the line's sort key.
>   When a character is not an integer, but the previous character was, add
> the origin to the
>   string of digits and append the sum to the line's sort key.
>   */
> 
>   repeat for each line tLine in tData
>     put empty into tCharPrev
>     put empty into tDigits -- note: tDigits tracks the most recent digits
>     put empty into tNonDigits -- note: tNonDigits tracks the most recent
> characters other than digits
>     put empty into tSortKey
> 
>     repeat for each char tChar in tLine
>       if tChar is an integer then
>         if tCharPrev is an integer then
>           put tChar after tDigits
>         else
>           put tChar into tDigits
>           if tNonDigits is not empty then
>             put tNonDigits & tSortDelimiter after tSortKey
>             put empty into tNonDigits
>           end if
>         end if
>       else
>         if tCharPrev is an integer then
>           put tChar into tNonDigits
>           put tOrigin + tDigits & tSortDelimiter after tSortKey
>           put empty into tDigits
>         else
>           put tChar after tNonDigits
>         end if
>       end if
>       put tChar into tCharPrev
>     end repeat
> 
>     if tDigits is not empty then
>       put tOrigin + tDigits after tSortKey
>     else if tNonDigits is not empty then
>       put tNonDigits after tSortKey
>     end if
>     put tSortKey into tSortKeys[tLine]
>   end repeat
> 
>   sort tData by tSortKeys[each]
> end sort_a1a
> 
> 
> 
> Hugh Senior
> FLCo
> 
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