Here is a possible solution with your own sort functio (this one sorts the dates in descending order, if you change the oder of the comparisons then you can easily get it to sort in ascending order).

#!/user/bin/perl

use warnings;
use strict;

my @dates = (
    '01-31 01:33',
    '01-30 22:10',
    '01-12 05:59',
    '01-02 01:33',
    '01-24 01:42',
    '01-12 05:56',
);

print "The dates to be sorted are:\n";
my $numDates = scalar(@dates);
my $colCount = 0;
for(my $i = 0; $i < $numDates; $i++){
   $colCount++;
   if($colCount > 3){
      $colCount = 1;
      print "\n";
   } # end if
   print "   $dates[$i]";
} # end for $i loop
print "\n";


my @sortedDates = sort mySort @dates;

print "The sorted dates are:\n";
$numDates = scalar(@dates);
$colCount = 0;
for(my $i = 0; $i < $numDates; $i++){
   $colCount++;
   if($colCount > 3){
      $colCount = 1;
      print "\n";
   } # end if
   print "   $dates[$i]";
} # end for $i loop
print "\n";





exit(0);



sub mySort {
     my($part1a,$part2a) = split(/\s+/,$a);
     my($part1b,$part2b) = split(/\s+/,$b);
     my($mon_a,$day_a)   = split(/-/,$part1a);
     my($mon_b,$day_b)   = split(/-/,$part1b);
     my($hr_a,$min_a)     = split(/:/,$part2a);
     my($hr_b,$min_b)    = split(/:/,$part2b);
     return 0 if($a eq $b);
     if($mon_a == $mon_b) {
        if($day_a == $day_b) {
           if($hr_a == $hr_b) {
              return ($min_a <=> $min_b);
           } elsif($hr_a < $hr_b) {
              return -1;
           } else {
              return 1;
           }
        } elsif($day_a < $day_b) {
           return -1;
        } else {
           return 1;
        }
     } elsif($mon_a < $mon_b) {
        return -1;
     } else {
        return 1;
     }
} # end sub mySort()

[download]

Note that I moved some of the dates in your @dates around so that you can see that it does, indeed, sort them.

ack Albuquerque, NM

In reply to Re: Sort by Date and Time by ack
in thread Sort by Date and Time by zod

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