Sort String list with Numeric Values

Question

I have a list of string, which is most likely, but not guaranteed to contain a list of numerics, i.e.,

{"1", "6", "2", "21", "89"}

What is the way to sort the string list so that it will always appear in ascending order?

I can't parse the string to numeric first before doing the sorting simply because the string can contain non numeric characters. And I don't want to go through the list and check-cast each component to numerics and do the sorting. Is there already a library existing out there for this purpose?

In the case where we have mix numerics and non-numeric string item, numeric strings always take precedence over the non numeric ones.

The phrase you're looking for is "natural order sort".

Ken
– Ken

2010-02-08 15:41:10 +00:00
Commented Feb 8, 2010 at 15:41 — Ken
– Ken, Commented Feb 8, 2010 at 15:41

Community · Accepted Answer · 2017-05-23 12:33:58Z

8

This has been asked before slightly differently, but the same answer still applies, as they have a C# implementation on the same site.

SO Question: Sort on a string that may contain a number

Answer provided by ScArcher2: The Alphanum Algorithm

edited May 23, 2017 at 12:33

CommunityBot

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answered Feb 7, 2010 at 14:24

Nick Craver

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Steven · Accepted Answer · 2010-02-07 14:25:58Z

1

You want to sort elements, just like Windows XP Explorer does with files. See this article on how to do this.

answered Feb 7, 2010 at 14:25

Steven

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Comments

David Gladfelter · Accepted Answer · 2010-02-07 14:24:04Z

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If this is C#, that's what Int32.TryParse() is for.

If this is C++, then std::string::find_first_not_of is a decent bet. Pass it a string containing the ascii chars for the digits 0 to 9 (plus the minus and plus signs?) and if it returns -1 then it is an integer.

answered Feb 7, 2010 at 14:24

David Gladfelter

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1 Comment

Steven Over a year ago

Nope, he want to be able to sort lists like this one: { a1, a10, a11, a2, a3 } in a natural way: { a1, a2, a3, a10, a11 }. TryParse will obviously not work.

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