I think that you want to read A Fresh Look at Efficient Perl Sorting by Uri Guttman and Larry Rosler. It's the best paper out there that completely explains sort, especially sorting in Perl. There's also a companion module that you'll want to look at: Sort::Maker.

In reply to Re: sorting very large text files by Khen1950fx
in thread sorting very large text files by rnaeye

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