Question

Hi all please look at my table below

Name
----------
Banaskantha - 66-DV
Banaskantha - 66-MM
Banaskantha-Dv
Banaskantha-MM
Bharuch - 77-RP
Bharuch-RP
hg-SR

but I want this table in below order

Name
-------------
Banaskantha-Dv
Banaskantha-MM
Banaskantha - 66-DV
Banaskantha - 66-MM
Bharuch-RP
Bharuch - 77-RP
hg-SR

How can I do that ?

Answer 1

Try the following sql statement:

 SELECT name, 
       case isnumeric(SUBSTRING(name, LEN(name)-4,2))
     when 1 then
             left(name, len(name)-8) + 'z' + RIGHT(name, 2) + '-' + SUBSTRING(name, LEN(name)-4,2)
         else name 
   end as sortby
FROM [your table name]
order by sortby

The query adds a field for sorting purposes. The value of that field depends if the name field has numeric value in it. If yes, it converts it to perfix (i.e. ‘Banaskantha’) + ‘z’ (so it will be below any instance of the prefix without the suffix), suffix (i.e. ‘DV’) + the numeric value. If it has no numeric value then it keeps the original value.

I made several assumptions:

1. The numeric value is always starts 5 characters from the end
2. There is always space between the prefix (i.e. Banaskantha) and the ‘-‘ and between the ‘-‘ and the numeric value when there is numeric value in field value
3. There is no space between the prefix and suffix when the field value has no numeric value in it.

If one of the assumptions is not correct, rewrite the SQL statement accordingly.

Let me say that the problem starts because there is no consistency in the field value. In such case I would suggest to create a field in the table for sorting purposes and populate it based on insert and update triggers.