Sort alphanumerics

Hello,

you can just use the sort function to do that:

pinNames = list("AB1" "1" "C2" "3" "B" "C" "A1" "D" "A2" "AA1" "AA2")
pinNames = sort(pinNames 'alphalessp)

Beware, because the sort function is destructive. If the álphalessp doesn't do what you are looking for you can always use custom lambda as the second argument for sorting, simple example below:

bBoxes = sort(bBoxes lambda((a b) leftEdge(a) < leftEdge(b) ))

Regards,
Petar

Hello,

unfortunately the sort function does not work ideally. It somehow sort the list but also puts A10 before A2 and so on:

well this requires a little more work, you need to write your own custom comparator function for this. So technically you need to break down every pin name into a leading alphanumeric part and a trailing digital part, best way to do this is a regular expression. The primary sort criteria will be the alphanumeric part. The alphanumeric parts will be compared with alphalessp(). Only if two pins have the same alphanumeric part, the trailing number will be compared with lessp(). What makes things even more tricky is that both the alphanumeric as well as the digital part are optional so there's quite a few corner cases. Below is an example of such a comparator function, It's not the most elegant code in he world but I think it does the job:

defun myComp (a b)
(let (a1 a2 b1 b2 (regex (pcreCompile "(\\D+)?(\\d+)?")))
(if (or (atoi a) (atoi b)) then
(cond
((and (atoi a) (atoi b))
(lessp (atoi a) (atoi b)))
((atoi a)
t)
((atoi b)
nil))
else
(pcreExecute regex a)
a1 = (pcreSubstitute regex "\\1")
a2 = (pcreSubstitute regex "\\2")
(pcreExecute regex b)
b1 = (pcreSubstitute regex "\\1")
b2 = (pcreSubstitute regex "\\2")
(if (a1==b1)
(lessp (or (atoi a2) 0) (or (atoi b2) 0))
(alphalessp a1 b1)))))

pinNames=(sort pinNames 'myComp)

Max

well this requires a little more work, you need to write your own custom comparator function for this. So technically you need to break down every pin name into a leading alphanumeric part and a trailing digital part, best way to do this is a regular expression. The primary sort criteria will be the alphanumeric part. The alphanumeric parts will be compared with alphalessp(). Only if two pins have the same alphanumeric part, the trailing number will be compared with lessp(). What makes things even more tricky is that both the alphanumeric as well as the digital part are optional so there's quite a few corner cases. Below is an example of such a comparator function, It's not the most elegant code in he world but I think it does the job:

defun myComp (a b)
(let (a1 a2 b1 b2 (regex (pcreCompile "(\\D+)?(\\d+)?")))
(if (or (atoi a) (atoi b)) then
(cond
((and (atoi a) (atoi b))
(lessp (atoi a) (atoi b)))
((atoi a)
t)
((atoi b)
nil))
else
(pcreExecute regex a)
a1 = (pcreSubstitute regex "\\1")
a2 = (pcreSubstitute regex "\\2")
(pcreExecute regex b)
b1 = (pcreSubstitute regex "\\1")
b2 = (pcreSubstitute regex "\\2")
(if (a1==b1)
(lessp (or (atoi a2) 0) (or (atoi b2) 0))
(alphalessp a1 b1)))))

pinNames=(sort pinNames 'myComp)

Max