Sorting a Hash

LostS has asked for the wisdom of the Perl Monks concerning the following question:

Hey Everyone
OK The company I am with wants me to accomplish this. Take 4 flat files. Each one contianing the names and info of the employees in that department. They want a search engine. I need to search each file if they select all or search search individual files if they select a group. Now my issue is on sorting. I need to sort first by the last name then by the first name. So say Williams, John will come before Williams, Sam. How would I setup this type os sort criteria where it sorts by last name then sorts by first name... Any suggestions or questions??

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Billy S.
Slinar Hardtail - Guildless
Datal Ephialtes - Guildless
RallosZek.Net Admin/WebMaster
Aerynth.Net Admin/WebMaster

perl -e '$cat = "cat"; if ($cat =~ /\143\x61\x74/) { print "Its a cat!
+\n"; } else { print "Thats a dog\n"; } print "\n";'
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Re: Sorting a Hash by Masem (Monsignor) on Oct 19, 2001 at 00:24 UTC
`my @sorted_keys = sort { $hash{$a}->{last} cmp $hash{$b}->{last} \|\| $hash{$a}->{first} cmp $hash{$b}->{first} } keys %hash;` [download] ----------------------------------------------------- Dr. Michael K. Neylon - mneylon-pm@masemware.com \|\| "You've left the lens cap of your mind on again, Pinky" - The Brain "I can see my house from here!" It's not what you know, but knowing how to find it if you don't know that's important	[reply] [d/l]
Re: Sorting a Hash by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Oct 19, 2001 at 00:22 UTC
Pass a function into sort that sorts on two criteria. This kind of problem is directly addressed in a very large number of nodes (doing a SuperSearch for "search" might help) as well as in nearly every Perl book ever printed. ------ We are the carpenters and bricklayers of the Information Age. Don't go borrowing trouble. For programmers, this means Worry only about what you need to implement.	[reply]
Re: Re: Sorting a Hash by jackdied (Monk) on Oct 19, 2001 at 01:54 UTC
Also check out Schwartzian Transform, which is just the name given to using sort efficiently with complex data structures. Even if you don't use it for this project, you will sooner or later. -jackdied	[reply]
as always, perldoc -q is your friend by Fletch (Bishop) on Oct 19, 2001 at 07:00 UTC
`$ perldoc -q sort Found in /usr/lib/perl5/5.6.1/pod/perlfaq4.pod How do I sort an array by (anything)? ... How do I sort a hash (optionally by value instead of key)? ... How can I always keep my hash sorted? ...` [download]	[reply] [d/l]