Re: Sorting an array on multiple keys using SORTA

[Barbara Morris <bmorris@xxxxxxxxxx>]

rob@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
> Yeah, but the original OP said they were all in order.  So why not sort by
> one, overlaying all 7?

Some of the OP's first 7 fields are numeric.  Say you have -12345 and
00123 zoned; hex values are X'F1F2F3F4D5' and X'F0F0F1F2F3'.  Comparing
hex values, -12345 is bigger than 00123.  You have to compare them as
numeric values to get the correct comparison.  The same thing happens
for all numeric types other than unsigned.  And varying-length string
types, non-ISO dates etc.

Comparing a group of subfields as a single character value only works if
all the subfields are A/C/G (not varying) or Z, non-USA T, or D with
some yyyy mm dd format.  For other types, the natural sort order is
different from the hex order.