python sort key functions code example

Example 1: python sort list in place

# Basic syntax:
your_list.sort()

# Example usage:
your_list = [42, 17, 23, 111]
your_list.sort()
print(your_list)
--> [17, 23, 42, 111]

# If you have a list of numbers that are of type string, you can do the
# following to sort them numerically without first converting to type 
# int. E.g.:
your_list = ['42', '17', '23', '111']
your_list.sort(key=int)
print(your_list)
--> ['17', '23', '42', '111']

# If you want to sort a list of strings in place based on a number 
# that is consistently located at some position in the strings, use
# a lambda function. E.g.:
your_list =['cmd1','cmd10', 'cmd111', 'cmd50', 'cmd99']
your_list.sort(key=lambda x: int(x[3:]))
print(your_list)
--> ['cmd1', 'cmd10', 'cmd50', 'cmd99', 'cmd111']

# If you don't want to sort the list in place, used sorted. E.g.:
your_list = [42, 17, 23, 111]
your_list_sorted = sorted(your_list)
print(your_list_sorted)
--> [17, 23, 42, 111]

Example 2: python sort

nums = [4,8,5,2,1]
#1 sorted() (Returns sorted list)
sorted_nums = sorted(nums)
print(sorted_nums)#[1,2,4,5,8]
print(nums)#[4,8,5,2,1]

#2 .sort() (Changes original list)
nums.sort()
print(nums)#[1,2,4,5,8]