Genii Weblog

Sorting... in this day and age?

Thu 15 Jul 2004, 11:11 AM



by Ben Langhinrichs
There was a question in the Gold forums about sorting lines of text in rich text.  Somebody wanted to sort in rich text!  The nerve!  Why would anybody want to sort?  Next thing you know, they'll want to print.  Don't they know it is 2004.

In any case, if you are one of those hopeless folks who think that sorting items might be useful [ha! Imagine if Lotus 1 2 3 had allowed sorting.  It might have become the defining killer app of its time], I guess I will begrudgingly let you know that our Midas Rich Text LSX will actually let you sort.  Sort rows of tables.  Sort sections.  Sort bullet items.  Sort text paragraphs.  Heck, it will probably even let you sort graphics if they are named.  Oh the shame!  I try to keep these things secret, but I must confess adding that functionality in 1997, for Version 1.00 of Midas, when Notes Release 4.1 was the hot ticket.  

See what I mean?  Obviously, if sorting were important, IBM would have added it to the core functionality, at least for tables, by Notes/Domino Release 7.  Sorting is clearly never needed by real companies.  Not a chance.  No way.

Therefore, I must apologize, and will now return you to your regularly scheduled blog reading.

Copyright © 2004 Genii Software Ltd.

What has been said:


182.1. Christopher Byrne (07/15/2004 08:56 AM)

You mean like being able to sort email by subject out of the box?????


182.2. Ben Langhinrichs (07/15/2004 10:23 AM)

Nope. I mean like:

Elephants have ears.

Crabs have claws.

Pandas have paws.

If I were to sort the paragraphs in this rich text field, the result would be:

Crabs have claws.

Elephants have ears.

Pandas have paws.

or if I had multiple sections titled Demos, Production, Sales and Contacts, respectively, the sections would be sorted as Contacts, Demos, Production and then Sales.

Imagine you forward a whole slew of messages at once. They each become a section, and you could sort the sections by title. That sort of thing.


182.3. Christopher Byrne (07/16/2004 06:40 AM)

I guess you missed my tongue being planted firmly in cheek:-)