Sort a list using first letter of Surname.

[maya_bglore]

Hello all,

 

I would be getting the following entries from a user in the format,

FirstName    SurName    RollNum    Marks

Linda              Jones        345            78

Abby                Gail            100            90

Mark                Polo            234          67

 

The issue is to rearrange the list by sorting the first letter in surname.How do I

go about this??

 

thanks in advance,

 

[trq]

How exactly is this data being inputted by the user and where is it being stored (if at all)?

[maya_bglore]

Hi again,

 

The data is being got from a form.My main problem is the way I can store the data.

Once i extract all the first letters of the surname,i would be able 2 sort it.But how could i rearrange the list then??

[GingerRobot]

Do you think we could see some of the code you have already? Even seeing the form might help us understand what you're trying to do a bit better.

[maya_bglore]

sorry..I havent yet done the form..but that is the requirement.User selects the number of entries he want to feed into the system.testboxes are then generated accordingly.All the details are entered and submitted.Once the sorting is done,the list needs to be displayed.

[GingerRobot]

Right, i would suggest that you name each of your form items as arrays:

<input type="text" name="firstname[]" />

<input type="text" name="surname[]" />

 

You will then have arrays of the following: firstname, surname, roll number and marks. Use the function asort() to sort the surname array whilst maintaining the keys. You can then loop through the array and pull the data from the other arrays with the corresponding keys. Hope that makes some sense

[maya_bglore]

thankx,I got your concept.But I'm bit of a 'beginner' here...how do i generate the keys..bcos the arrays i.e firstname,surname etc are all indexed arrays..how can i make them associative arrays???

[GingerRobot]

The idea is that they are indexed arrays.