sorting arrays ignoring square brackets 1

[zumbabumba]

Hi all. Is there any efficient way to sort arrays ignoring square brackets and/or other characters? Suppose you have:

@names = ('[Ca]rl', 'Bil[l]y', 'Alan');

I want the output of sort @names be: Alan Bil[l]y [Ca]rl. The standard sort outputs [Ca]rl Alan Bil[l]y beacuse square brackets come first in alphabetical order. By now I thought I can copy the names having square brackets in them, remove brackets, sort them, and replace those having brackets, but I guess this is not the perlistic way.

 

[ishnid]

With those examples, they sort ok for me, but I get what you're asking. Here's a solution using a Schwarzian Transform:

@names = map $_->[0],
        sort { $a->[1] cmp $b->[1] }
        map { (my $n = $_ ) =~ tr/a-zA-Z0-9//cd; [ $_, $n ] }
        @names;

 

[zumbabumba]

Thanks Ishnid! It works very well. Now I just have to understand what a Schwarzian Transform is.

 

[KevinADC]

The Schwart[z]ian Transform is a well discussed topic, a google search will find many resources that explain it, here is my own attempt to explain it in a perl centric way:

http://www.thescripts.com/forum/thread775438.html

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- Kevin, perl coder unexceptional!

 

[travs69]

Didn't they just make a movie about it, big robots and all that?






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Travis - Those who say it cannot be done are usually interrupted by someone else doing it; Give the wrong symptoms, get the wrong solutions;