Need a sorting routine

[TerryRitchie]

@TerryRitchie A working example for you:

Code: (Select All)

Screen _NewImage(800, 600, 32)

Type DATATYPE
    a As Integer
    b As Integer
    c As Integer
End Type

Const Limit = 1000000 'one million defalt limit

ReDim SortedList(1 To Limit) As DATATYPE

For i = 1 To Limit
    SortedList(i).a = Int(Rnd * 32767) + 1
    SortedList(i).b = Int(Rnd * 32767) + 1
    SortedList(i).c = Int(Rnd * 32767) + 1
Next

For i = 1 To 30
    Print SortedList(i).a, SortedList(i).b, SortedList(i).c
Next
Sleep

FakeSort SortedList()
Print
Print "=== Sorted ==="
Print
For i = 1 To 30
    Print SortedList(i).a, SortedList(i).b, SortedList(i).c
Next


Sub FakeSort (Array() As DATATYPE)
    Dim S(1 To 32767) As String
    Dim TempArray(1 To Limit) As DATATYPE
    For i = 1 To Limit 'build the sorted index in a single pass
        S(Array(i).a) = S(Array(i).a) + MKL$(i)
    Next

    Count = 0
    For i = 1 To 32767
        For J = 1 To Len(S(i)) Step 4 'we stored our index as long values
            Count = Count + 1
            t$ = Mid$(S(i), J, 4)
            index = CVL(t$)
            TempArray(Count) = Array(index)
        Next
    Next

    For i = 1 To Limit
        Array(i) = TempArray(i)
    Next
End Sub

This is a very interesting approach. When I set the limit to 32767 I get speeds on average of .040 seconds which, while blazingly fast, unfortunately is still ~4 times slower than the Qsort routine mdijkens posted at .012 seconds for 32767 indexes.