in reply to How to compare time in perl

You don't have to parse the dates. Since the strings are a) constant width and consistently formatted, and b) organized left-to-right in order of granularity, you can simply use a string comparison. Like so: 

#!/usr/bin/perl

@data = <DATA>;
chomp @data;

foreach (sort { $a cmp $b } @data) {
  print "$_\n";
}


__END__
2003/02/05 17:32:06.179
2003/02/05 17:32:06.159
2003/01/05 17:32:06.179
1999/01/05 17:32:06.179

[download]
When run this prints:
1999/01/05 17:32:06.179
2003/01/05 17:32:06.179
2003/02/05 17:32:06.159
2003/02/05 17:32:06.179

[download]

Matt

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re: Re: How to compare time in perl
by tachyon (Chancellor) on Feb 08, 2003 at 19:50 UTC

    The equal width and 0 packing of single digits is vital as this will choke cmp: 

    2003/02/05 2:32:06.179
2003/02/05 17:32:06.179
2003/02/05 20:32:06.159

    [download]
    cheers

    tachyon

    s&&rsenoyhcatreve&&&s&n.+t&"$'$`$\"$\&"&ee&&y&srve&&d&&print

[reply]
[d/l]
      Even if they aren't to begin with he can normalize them first: 
        
  $time=~s{
           #$1    $2    $3      $4    $5    $6     $7
           (\d+)/(\d+)/(\d+)\s+(\d+):(\d+):(\d+)\.(\d+)
          }
          {
           sprintf '%04d/%02d/%02d %02d:%02d:%02d.%3d',
                    $1,  $2,  $3,  $4,  $5,  $6,  $7
          }xe
      or die "Failed to normalize '$time'\n";

      [download]

      --- demerphq
      my friends call me, usually because I'm late....

[reply]
[d/l]

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