TSORT v2.10 - field oriented sorting
Documentation revised 21 Oct 00 - Copyright (c) 1996-2000 by Rune Berg. TextTools Freeware.

Contents:


Usage Top || Next

tsort [log logfile] [options] [from infile] [to outfile] expression [...]

See Understanding The Usage Section for details.


Description Top || Previous || Next

tsort sorts infile on the results of the given expression(s), and writes the sorted data to outfile. Expressions are as for tcols.

infile must be an ASCII text file. tsort sees each input line as a row of (by default) whitespace-separated fields; see tcols for more info.

tsort ignores empty (whitespace only) input lines.

tsort compares expression results according to the following rules:

tsort retains the relative order of lines for which the expressions evaluate the same.

The output lines are identical to the input lines. tsort only changes their order.

If you don't specify infile, tsort reads from standard input.
If you don't specify outfile, tsort writes to standard output.
If you don't specify logfile, tsort writes error messages to standard error.


Example Top || Previous || Next

Consider the file "records.txt":

      Band             "The Band"            1969
      "Violent Femmes" "Violent Femmes"      1983
      Beatles          Revolver              1966
      Beatles          "Rubber Soul"         1965
      "Waits, Tom"     Swordfishtrombones    1983
      Band             "Music From Big Pink" 1968

The command:

      tsort from records.txt $1.duqt $3

sorts the records on band/artist name (stripped of surrounding double quotes) and further on year of release, printing:

      Band             "Music From Big Pink" 1968
      Band             "The Band"            1969
      Beatles          "Rubber Soul"         1965
      Beatles          Revolver              1966
      "Violent Femmes" "Violent Femmes"      1983
      "Waits, Tom"     Swordfishtrombones    1983


Options Top || Previous || Next

tsort recognizes the following command line options:


Limitations Top || Previous || Next

tsort has the same limitations as tcols.

tsort runs out of memory when infile, or the expressions evaluated thereof, are too large.


Return Codes Top || Previous || Next

tsort returns with one of the following codes ("error levels"):

For more details, see TextTools General Features.


Version History Top || Previous

These are the released versions of tsort:

End of document