If all you care about is the minimum and maximum value in the column, sorting is overkill. Sorting is an O(NlogN) operation. You can make a single pass (O(N)) through the values in the column, keeping track of the minimum and maximum values.

In reply to Re: sorting columns and getting the largest ansd smallest values in each column by jpl
in thread sorting columns and getting the largest ansd smallest values in each column by $new_guy

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