SORT Function

Sorts the contents of an array.

result = SORT(array)

array The vector or array to be sorted.

result A vector of subscripts which allow access to the elements of array in ascending order.

None.

String arrays are sorted using the ASCII collating sequence. The result is always a vector of long integer type with the same number of elements as array.

The contents of the result are the sorted indices, not the values themselves.

This example uses SORT to obtain the vector of subscripts that places the single-precision, floating-point vector a into ascending order. To obtain elements of a in sorted order, use the vector of subscripts returned by SORT as the subscript vector for a.

a = [4.0, 3.0, 7.0, 1.0, 2.0]

; Create an unsorted single-precision, floating-point vector.

b = SORT(a)

; Place the vector of sorting subscripts into b.

PRINT, b

3       4       1       0       2

PRINT, a(b)

; Print the sorted vector by using b as the subscript vector for a.

1.00000 2.00000 3.00000 4.00000 7.00000

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