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Sort selections: SORT (SO)

This command sorts 1 to 8 input tables in ascending or descending order of one or more keywords. The first keyword determines the primary order.

SORT[/qualifiers] keyword[/ASC][/DESC][,...]

In order to prevent unexpected long sorts, ARCQUERY will prompt for confirmation if more than 1000 records are to be sorted.

Sorting may be done on up to 26 different Observations Catalogue keywords (see table ). The qualifiers /ASCENDING (default) and /DESCENDING can be command qualifiers as well as keyqualifiers. In the first case they apply to all keywords, in the latter case they apply to one keyword only. The command qualifier determines the default sorting order for all keywords which are not explicitly qualified differently.

Up to eight input tables may be specified with the /INPUT_TABLE qualifier. They will be sorted into one output table (specified by /OUTPUT_TABLE, or derived from the name of the first-mentioned input table, see HELP information on ARCQUERY TABLE_NAMES or section ). If performed on more than one input table the SORT command is almost equivalent to the UNION command (see section ).


Fri Aug 12 10:24:53 BST 1994