Just for the hack of it, can I peddle a postgres version of a 'solution'?

Assuming a postgres instance, with module file_fdw installed, and your 5 text lines tab-separated saved under '/tmp/table.txt': 

create server abc_server foreign data wrapper file_fdw;
create foreign table file_table ( c1 text, i2 int, i3 int)
    server abc_server
    options ( filename '/tmp/table.txt', format 'csv', delimiter E'\t'
+ );
select c1, i2, i3 from file_table order by c1; 
select c1, i2     from file_table order by i2 desc;
select c1, i3     from file_table order by i3 desc;
select c1
     , rank() over (order by i2 desc)  
     , rank() over (order by i3 desc)
from file_table
order by c1;

[download]

Output (mimicking yours): 

$ psql -qXf table.sql 
 c1 | i2 | i3 
----+----+----
 a  | 23 | 11
 b  | 24 | 15
 c  | 16 | 19
 d  |  8 |  2
 e  | 40 | 41
(5 rows)

 c1 | i2 
----+----
 e  | 40
 b  | 24
 a  | 23
 c  | 16
 d  |  8
(5 rows)

 c1 | i3 
----+----
 e  | 41
 c  | 19
 b  | 15
 a  | 11
 d  |  2
(5 rows)

 c1 | rank | rank 
----+------+------
 a  |    3 |    4
 b  |    2 |    3
 c  |    4 |    2
 d  |    5 |    5
 e  |    1 |    1
(5 rows)

[download]

Not entirely serious as a solution but I thought is was cute all the same: it is also the shortest till now, with only 3 lines :)

In reply to Re: manipulating a data table by erix
in thread manipulating a data table by v15

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