Re: confusion with sort

Thanks, that seems to have done the trick.  I never noticed in the 
documentation that it states:

"A pair of lines is compared as follows: sort compares each pair of fields, 
in the order specified on the command line, according to the associated 
ordering options, until a difference is found or no fields are left. If no 
key fields are specified, sort uses a default key of the entire line. 
Finally, as a last resort when all keys compare equal, sort compares entire 
lines as if no ordering options other than --reverse (-r) were specified. 
The --stable (-s) option disables this last-resort comparison so that lines 
in which all fields compare equal are left in their original relative 
order."

That last part that begins with Finally... is the part I missed.

"Kam-Hung Soh" <[email protected]> wrote in message 
news:[email protected]...

> Try adding the "-s" option, which "... disables this last-resort
> comparison so that lines in which all fields compare equal are left in
> their original relative order."