text sortType

[Dar Scott]

Whoops, I didn't read Peter's solution all the way.  

I guessed at what he was doing instead of giving it the attention it deserved.

I guess my thumbs up was for using the sorting value function and for putting in zero digits.

I would (off the top of my head) simplify (and change) that to this:

function reformatLine pL
  get item 1 of it
  return (word 1 to -2 of it) && char -6 to -1 of ("000000" & word -1 of it)
end reformatLine

By adding leading zeros for a fixed length, a text sort is the same as a number sort.

A 3rd solution is to put fixed length numerals in the last word of the original data.

(I could try using the *s as an excuse, but it is not a good excuse, sorry for commenting after only a glance.)

Dar


On May 28, 2013, at 1:51 PM, Dar Scott wrote:

> I think this and Geoff's are good!  This one is more general if you can come up with some sort of metric or sortvalue for each item/list.  Geoff's is simpler for this case.  The speed difference will depend on the length of the list.  
> 
> Shouldn't the zero be put 'before' instead of 'after' to force a numerical sort?
> 
> Also, there is a shortcut.  
> 
> put char -6 to -1 of ("000000" & tKey) into tKey
> 
> Dar
> 
> 
> On May 28, 2013, at 1:41 PM, Peter Haworth wrote:
> 
>> The following worked for me (with apologies ofr any asterisks that may be
>> inserted into the script by my email client)
>> 
>> It assumes there won;t be any numbers > 6 digits.
>> 
>> *on* mouseUp
>> 
>>  *sort* lines of field "Field" by reformatLine(each)
>> 
>> *end* mouseUp
>> 
>> 
>> *function* reformatLine l
>> 
>>  *local* tKey
>> 
>>  *put* word 1 to -2 of item 1 of l into tKey
>> 
>>  *repeat* 6-the length of word -1 of item 1 of l
>> 
>>     *put* zero after tKey
>> 
>>  *end* *repeat*
>> 
>>  *put* word -1 of item 1 of l after tKey
>> 
>>  *return* tKey
>> 
>> *end* reformatLine
>> 
>> Pete
>> lcSQL Software <http://www.lcsql.com>
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