Sort::Versions(3pm) User Contributed Perl Documentation Sort::Versions(3pm)
NAME
Sort::Versions - a perl 5 module for sorting of revision-like numbers
SYNOPSIS
use Sort::Versions;
@l = sort { versioncmp($a, $b) } qw( 1.2 1.2.0 1.2a.0 1.2.a 1.a 02.a );
...
use Sort::Versions;
print 'lower' if versioncmp('1.2', '1.2a') == -1;
...
use Sort::Versions;
%h = (1 => 'd', 2 => 'c', 3 => 'b', 4 => 'a');
@h = sort { versioncmp($h{$a}, $h{$b}) } keys %h;
DESCRIPTION
Sort::Versions allows easy sorting of mixed non-numeric and numeric
strings, like the 'version numbers' that many shared library systems
and revision control packages use. This is quite useful if you are
trying to deal with shared libraries. It can also be applied to
applications that intersperse variable-width numeric fields within
text. Other applications can undoubtedly be found.
For an explanation of the algorithm, it's simplest to look at these
examples:
1.1 < 1.2
1.1a < 1.2
1.1 < 1.1.1
1.1 < 1.1a
1.1.a < 1.1a
1 < a
a < b
1 < 2
1.1-3 < 1.1-4
1.1-5 < 1.1.6
More precisely (but less comprehensibly), the two strings are treated
as subunits delimited by periods or hyphens. Each subunit can contain
any number of groups of digits or non-digits. If digit groups are being
compared on both sides, a numeric comparison is used, otherwise a ASCII
ordering is used. A group or subgroup with more units will win if all
comparisons are equal. A period binds digit groups together more
tightly than a hyphen.
Some packages use a different style of version numbering: a simple real
number written as a decimal. Sort::Versions has limited support for
this style: when comparing two subunits which are both digit groups, if
either subunit has a leading zero, then both are treated like digits
after a decimal point. So for example:
0002 < 1
1.06 < 1.5
This won't always work, because there won't always be a leading zero in
real-number style version numbers. There is no way for Sort::Versions
to know which style was intended. But a lot of the time it will do the
right thing. If you are making up version numbers, the style with
(possibly) more than one dot is the style to use.
USAGE
The function "versioncmp()" takes two arguments and compares them like
"cmp". With perl 5.6 or later, you can also use this function directly
in sorting:
@l = sort versioncmp qw(1.1 1.2 1.0.3);
The function "versions()" can be used directly as a sort function even
on perl 5.005 and earlier, but its use is deprecated.
SEE ALSO
version, CPAN::Version which is part of the CPAN distribution.
REPOSITORY
<https://github.com/neilb/Sort-Versions>
AUTHOR
Ed Avis <ed@membled.com> and Matt Johnson <mwj99@doc.ic.ac.uk> for
recent releases; the original author is Kenneth J. Albanowski
<kjahds@kjahds.com>. Thanks to Hack Kampbjørn and Slaven Rezic for
patches and bug reports.
COPYRIGHT AND LICENSE
This software is copyright (c) 1996 by Kenneth J. Albanowski.
This is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under
the same terms as the Perl 5 programming language system itself.
perl v5.36.0 2022-11-20 Sort::Versions(3pm)
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