Sorting data based on second column of a file

Question

I have a file of two columns and n number of rows   column 1 contains names and column2 age   I want to sort the content of this file in ascending order based on the age  in second column    The result should display the name of the youngest person along with name and then second youngest person and so on     Any suggestions for a one liner shell or bash script

User · Answer

Use sort   sort     -k 2 2

User · Answer

Solution   sort -k 2 -n filename  more verbosely written as   sort --key 2 --numeric-sort filename    Example     cat filename A 12 B 48 C 3    sort --key 2 --numeric-sort filename  C 3 A 12 B 48     Explanation    -k   - this argument specifies the first column that will be used to sort   note that column here is defined as a whitespace delimited field  the argument -k5 will sort starting with the fifth field in each line  not the fifth character in each line  -n - this option specifies a  numeric sort  meaning that column should be interpreted as a row of numbers  instead of text      More   Other common options include    -r - this option reverses the sorting order  It can also be written as --reverse  -i - This option ignores non-printable characters  It can also be written as --ignore-nonprinting  -b - This option ignores leading blank spaces  which is handy as white spaces are used to determine the number of rows  It can also be written as --ignore-leading-blanks  -f - This option ignores letter case   A    a   It can also be written as --ignore-case  -t  new separator  - This option makes the preprocessing use a operator other than space  It can also be written as --field-separator    There are other options  but these are the most common and helpful ones  that I use often

User · Answer

You can use the sort command  sort -k2 -n yourfile   -n  --numeric-sort compare according to string numerical value  For example    cat ages txt  Bob 12 Jane 48 Mark 3 Tashi 54    sort -k2 -n ages txt  Mark 3 Bob 12 Jane 48 Tashi 54

User · Answer

For tab separated values the code below can be used  sort -t   t  -k2 -n   -r can be used for getting data in descending order  -n for numerical sort -k  --key POS1  POS2  where k is column in file For descending order below is the code   sort -t   t  -k2 -rn

[bash] Sorting data based on second column of a file

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