Good day fellow monks! I have been racking my brains on this one today. Before I ask my question let me show you the list I am trying to crunch:

        100!100!key!date!2..
        100!100!key!store!
        110!110!P\d\d\d_.*\.\d{6,}\.EMRemr
        120!125!
        1!yeada
        130!132!
        140!133!
        150!134!
        500!blah
        160!135!arbor_ama
        503!blah
        170!136!
        505!blah
        180!137!
        190!138!

[download]
All of that is in an array (by line, of course). I need to sort it by the number in the first field delimited by the '!' without actually affecting the elements in the original array.

I don't know *why* I can't think my way through this. Here is what I have tried:

my @array  = (all that stuff above);
   @array  = map { $_[0] = (split(/\!/,$_))[0]; }
             sort { $a <=> $b; } @array;

[download]
Which sorts great but it alters the elements in the original array such that all I get returned is the first field delimited by '!'.

The above code returns: 

        1
        100
        100
        110
        120
        130
        140
        150
        160
        170
        180
        190
        500
        503
        505

[download]

when what I need is:

        1
        100!100!key!date!2..
        100!100!key!store!
        110!110!P\d\d\d_.*\.\d{6,}\.EMRemr
        120!125!
        130!132!
        140!133!
        150!134!
        160!135!arbor_ama
        170!136!
        180!137!
        190!138!
        500!blah
        503!blah
        505!blah

[download]

I know I am missing something. What is it? :) sort{} is still a challenge to me sometimes.

TIA guys!

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
- Jim
Insert clever comment here...

In reply to Sort based on a delimited field in array elements without affecting original array elements by snafu

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