Microsoft Knowledge Base

File: Sort Command Does Not Seem to Sort Properly
Last reviewed: October 26, 1994
Article ID: Q20302
kbusage

Summary:

In Microsoft File, the Sort command on the Organize menu does not sort the data file into the correct order.

This problem occurs if leading or trailing blank spaces are typed in the field. If you have tried looking for spaces, differences in the input, and clearing the sort criteria with no success, then try doing the following:

WARNING: This procedure does not work for data files that contain picture fields; it causes information contained in picture fields to be lost.

  1. From the File menu, choose Save Records As.

  2. Save the document as a Text document.

  3. Create a new blank data file, and re-create the original form.

  4. With the records window active, choose Open Datafile from the File menu and load the text file.

  5. Delete the first record. This is the header record.

  6. Sort.

This procedure eliminates any leading or trailing spaces in the data. If this method does not correct the problem, you may have entered OPTION+RETURN into one or more of the fields. You must manually delete these OPTION+RETURN commands.

Note: This problem was partially corrected in File version 2.00, which recognizes a space before but not a space after as a character.

Additional reference words:
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Last reviewed: October 26, 1994
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