{"id":6163,"date":"2014-06-13T00:01:01","date_gmt":"2014-06-13T07:01:01","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=6163"},"modified":"2014-06-07T21:36:48","modified_gmt":"2014-06-08T04:36:48","slug":"the-power-of-words-sort-command","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/?p=6163","title":{"rendered":"The Power of Word’s Sort Command"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"sort The icon looks innocent enough. It’s featured prominently in the Table Tools\/Layout tab. But it also has a tiny twin in the Home tab’s Paragraph group. It’s the Sort icon.
\n
\nSorting is a table-activity; you sort things in a grid.<\/p>\n

In Figure 1 you see the table I created for an earlier post, the Solar System Object table. I’m using it again here so I don’t have to create another table from scratch.<\/p>\n

\"Figure

Figure 1. A table lurking in a document.<\/p><\/div>\n

To sort that table, click the mouse somewhere in the table. The Table Tools tabs appear.<\/p>\n

Choose the Table Tools\/Layout tab.<\/p>\n

Look in the Data group (on the right end of the Ribbon) and click the big Sort button. You see the Sort dialog box appear, similar to Figure 2.<\/p>\n

\"Figure

Figure 2. The Sort dialog box.<\/p><\/div>\n

The Sort dialog box is pretty smart. Because my table was designed with a header row, the Sort By drop-down list displays the title of a column in the header row. That’s convenient. To sort by the Mass column, I choose Mass Relative to Earth from the Sort By menu (see Figure 2), and then click the OK button.<\/p>\n

The table is sorted. The result is shown in Figure 3.<\/p>\n

\"Figure

Figure 3. The table is sorted.<\/p><\/div>\n

When a table has multiple columns, then you use the Then-By drop down menus. They let you sort in a given order, say, Dates, then Product Number, then Price. That’s all typical table stuff.<\/p>\n

Yet a mini Sort icon is found on the Home tab, in the Paragraphs group! Why?<\/p>\n

Because you can also sort paragraphs in Word!<\/p>\n

Effectively, a paragraph is simply a one-column table. It’s a row. If you have a series of paragraphs and need them to appear alphabetically, for example, you can sort them the same way you sort a table:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Select the paragraphs you want to sort.<\/li>\n
  2. On the Home tab, Paragraphs group, click the Sort icon. The Sort Text dialog box appears, which is an abbreviated version of what’s shown in Figure 2.<\/li>\n
  3. Just click the OK button in the Sort dialog box to sort the paragraphs alphabetically.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Ta-Da!<\/p>\n

    I’ve used this trick to sort simple lists in a document. That way I can type the list in any old order, usually the “as my brain thinks of things” order. After I’ve completed the list, I sort, I’m done.<\/p>\n

    And if anything is added to the list, select the entire list again, click the Sort button, and you’re done.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Word’s Sort command need not be limited to tables.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[9],"class_list":["post-6163","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-main","tag-word"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6163","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6163"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6163\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6184,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6163\/revisions\/6184"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6163"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6163"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wambooli.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6163"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}