Sorting an array of Javascript objects by string

Question

My question is similar to the one found here, but I'd like to sort by string only. Let's say I have the following HTML.

<tbody>
        <tr class="finance" data-order="1">
            <td>John Smith</td>
            <td>Finance</td>
        </tr>
        <tr class="marketing" data-order="2">
            <td>Jane Doe</td>
            <td>Marketing</td>
        </tr>
        <tr class="maintenance" data-order="3">
            <td>Gary Ryan</td>
            <td>Maintenance</td>
        </tr>
        <tr class="dataEntry" data-order="4">
            <td>Damon Watts</td>
            <td>Data Entry</td>
        </tr>
        <tr class="dataEntry" data-order="5">
            <td>Ben Young</td>
            <td>Data Entry</td>
        </tr>
        <tr class="maintenance" data-order="6">
            <td>Calvin Lewis</td>
            <td>Maintenance</td>
        </tr>
    </tbody>

How can I sort by the second td, in ascending or descending order? Right now I have something like this:

//Ascending Order
var tableRows = new Array();
    $("tbody tr").each(function(){
        tableRows.push(this);
    });
    console.log(tableRows);
    tableRows.sort(function(a, b){
        return( //not sure what to do here)
    }

That depends on whether or not you want locale-aware comparisons. — Frédéric Hamidi, May 21 '14 at 15:25
I don't think this works: `tableRows.push(this);` because `this` is bounded to the global object. — linstantnoodles, May 21 '14 at 15:26
@iaacp, I mean it depends on whether simple comparison is enough or if you have to use [localeCompare()](https://developer.mozilla.org/en-US/docs/Web/JavaScript/Reference/Global_Objects/String/localeCompare). — Frédéric Hamidi, May 21 '14 at 15:28
@linstantnoodles, not in the callback passed to `each()`, no. — Frédéric Hamidi, May 21 '14 at 15:28
This is more of a sidestep, but declaring arrays as [] in JavaScript is waaaay more efficient that using new Array() — Neil Hibbert, May 21 '14 at 15:29
Fred, ah, gotcha. Simple compare is fine :) @NeilHibbert thanks, I'll do that. — iaacp, May 21 '14 at 15:32
@linstantnoodles Thank you for the heads up. How should I fix it? — iaacp, May 21 '14 at 15:32
@iaacp ok disregard - `this` is bounded to current value. My bad. I was treating it the same as ECMAScript 5's forEach. — linstantnoodles, May 21 '14 at 16:07
@iaacp what do you want the output to be? A list of `td` elements or just the string values? — linstantnoodles, May 21 '14 at 20:14

score 1 · Answer 1 · answered May 21 '14 at 15:44

Just sort them ?

$("tbody tr").sort(function(a, b) {
    var a_txt = $(a).find('td').eq(1).text(),
        b_txt = $(b).find('td').eq(1).text();

    return a_txt.localeCompare(b_txt);
}).appendTo('tbody');

FIDDLE

To switch the order, just do b_txt.localeCompare(a_txt); instead

Sorting an array of Javascript objects by string

1 Answers1