Question

Not sure if this is possible, but there might be a creative approach…

Given this data in SQL Server 2005:

AAA
AAA
BBB
BBB
CCC
CCC
DDD
DDD

How could I return a result set sorted in a pattern like this:

AAA
BBB
CCC
DDD
AAA
BBB
CCC
DDD

Answer 1

If your column were called “col”, and your table were named “table”, I would try something like this:

WITH Indexes AS (
    SELECT 
    ROW_NUMBER() OVER (PARTITION BY col ORDER BY col) as __row,
    col
    FROM table)
SELECT col
FROM Indexes
ORDER BY __row, col;