Here's a quick little subroutine that I wrote awhile back that I use a fair amount. It will sort a multidimensional hash by the value of whatever "column" you specify and throw the sorted keys back to you.

BTW, I sometimes use this more than once in a script to filter results down...that is why I pass an array ref as the last arg (so I can filter if need be).

Was able to remove the temp hash based on what Juerd wrote...Could have sworn I tried formatting the compare that way.

$hash{'1'}->{"person"} = "Me";
$hash{'1'}->{"age"} = "27";
$hash{'2'}->{"person"} = "Wife";
$hash{'2'}->{"age"} = "26";
$hash{'3'}->{"person"} = "Dad";
$hash{'3'}->{"age"} = "54";
$hash{'4'}->{"person"} = "Brother";
$hash{'4'}->{"age"} = "24";


my @sortedKeys = sortHashByColumn(\%hash,"age","desc",[keys %hash]);
        
foreach my $sortedKey(@sortedKeys){
    print "$sortedKey: " . $hash{$sortedKey}->{'age'} . " " . $hash{$s
+ortedKey}->{'person'} . "\n";
}





sub sortHashByColumn{
    my($hashRef,$sortColumn,$sortDirection,$keysAR) = @_;
    my @sortedKeys;
    my $sortType;
    # VERIFY THAT THIS IS A VALID COLUMN
    if(! defined $hashRef->{$$keysAR[0]}->{$sortColumn}){
        print "sortHashByColumn Error: $sortColumn is not a column in 
+this hash.\n";
        exit(0);
    # VALID COLUMN, FIGURE OUT IF IT IS A NUMERIC COLUMN OR ALPHA
    } else {
        if($hashRef->{$$keysAR[0]}->{$sortColumn} =~ /^\d+/){
            $sortType = "numeric";
        } else {
            $sortType = "alpha";
        }
    }
    
    if($sortType eq "numeric"){
        if($sortDirection =~ /asc/i){
            @sortedKeys = sort { $hashRef->{$a}{$sortColumn} <=> $hash
+Ref->{$b}{$sortColumn} } @$keysAR;
        } else {
            @sortedKeys = sort { $hashRef->{$b}{$sortColumn} <=> $hash
+Ref->{$a}{$sortColumn} } @$keysAR;
        }
    } else {
        if($sortDirection =~ /asc/i){
            @sortedKeys = sort { $hashRef->{$a}{$sortColumn} cmp $hash
+Ref->{$b}{$sortColumn} } @$keysAR;
        } else {
            @sortedKeys = sort { $hashRef->{$b}{$sortColumn} cmp $hash
+Ref->{$a}{$sortColumn} } @$keysAR;
        }
    }


    return @sortedKeys;
}

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In reply to Sort Multidimensional Hash By Column by mdog

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