Re: RFC: add'l 'sort -n' options

[Matthew Woehlke]

Paul Eggert wrote:
> Matthew Woehlke writes:
> > '-N _options_, --numeric-sort=_options_'
>
> The other sort options can be attached to -k; how would this work here?

Sorry, I'm not sure I understand what you mean by this comment. What 
would be attached to -k, and how?

> > 'a': convert numbers with strtol(,0) (i.e. automatically recognize
> > '0x<num>' (hex), '0<num>' (octal).
> > 'o': all numbers are octal, i.e. strtol(,8)
> > 'x': all numbers are hexadecimal, i.e. strtol(,16)
>
> These shouldn't use strtol; they should work regardless of the size
> of the number, just as it already works for decimal numbers.

I was actually wondering about that... from the info page it sounded 
like strtod is actually used, but of course there is no reason why we 
would need to use strtol (as opposed to writing our own, as you seem to 
be implying). In fact, I too would probably prefer the latter. (I guess 
this means you would always convert numbers to [long] doubles?)

> > ...and in light of 'o', 'x', perhaps '-B <num>, --numeric-base <num>'
> > would be in order?
>
> Yes, perhaps.

Hmm, or maybe just -B0 would be equivalent to 'a' (like strtol), which 
would just leave 'r', 'h' and 'd'.

So... do you think these would be good ideas? I.e. if I submitted a 
patch, it would get considered? I am probably most interested in the 
human-readable options, especially in light of the comments w.r.t. du 
posted a few weeks back.

--
Matthew
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