Question

I have an array with strings comprising of numbers in a dotted notation as such:

var arr = ['1.2.5.4', '1.2.5.3'];

I would like to be able to find the string that denotes the highest value.

I already tried

Math.max.apply(null, arr)

Since there are multiple decimals, it simply won’t work.

Answer 1

This seems a simpler solution:

function latest (versions) {
  versions.sort (function (a, b) {
    a = a.split ('.');
    b = b.split ('.');   
    for (var i = 0; i < a.length && i < b.length && a[i] === b[i]; i++);
    return ((i === a.length) || (+a[i] < +b[i])) ? 1 : -1;
  });
  return versions[0]; 
}

[
  latest (['1.2.5.4', '1.3.5.3', '1.2.3.4.5', '1.24.2.1', '1.2.52']),
  latest (['1.2.5.4', '1.3.5.3', '1.2.3.4.5', '1.2.52']),
  latest (['1.2.5.4', '1.2.3.4.5', '1.2.52']),
  latest (['1.2.5.4', '1.2.3.4.5'])
]

/* Displays on JS console

    ["1.24.2.1", "1.3.5.3", "1.2.52", "1.2.5.4"]
*/

Thanks for the vote, on review I noted a bug which I have corrected in the code above.