How to Proc Sort Alphanumerically

[yawenyu]

Hello!

I am using SAS ver9.3 to sort observations. They are as follows:

NT1

NT2

T1

T2

T3

I would like to sort them as:

T1

T2

T3

NT1

NT2

A simple DECENDING statement does not work, and give me T3, T2, T1, NT2, NT1. Is there a proper way to sort this? Thank you in advance. I am new at SAS programming so apologies if there is a simple solution I am not realizing.

[Astounding · Accepted solution]

Well, there's not really a simple solution.  SAS isn't built to sort in an order that is neither ascending nor descending.  You would need to create an extra variable based on your old variable:

if oldvar =: 'T' then sort_order=1;

else sort_order=2;

Then use that as part of your sorting sequence:

proc sort data=have;

by sort_order oldvar;

run;

[yawenyu]

Thank you! This worked perfectly.