On Wed, 10 Jan 2007 12:19:08 -0600, Bill McCarthy <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> On Tue 9-Jan-07 4:12pm -0600, Arun Easi wrote: > > Lines with same 3rd field are sorted lexicographically. > > So, if you have MM/DD/YYYY format, that should be good. If > > you have DD/MM/YYYY, it cannot be (Try adding 31/11/1996 > > and 01/12/1996). > > Is this documented behavior? It certainly isn't mentioned > in the brief docs that come with the GnuWin32 version. Do > you have a URL that documents this? As far as I can remember sort has always performed that way, using the entire line as a "last resort" sort to resolve keys that would otherwise sort identically. I have vague memories of seeing this documented but I don't know where. I think the idea was that if you cared about the order of the lines you'd specify it, and if you didn't care then sort was free to use whatever algorithm it chose. -- Matthew Winn
