Object Array Sort

[Lohmeyer]

hiim trying to sort a set of html tags and i named them all "t"<input type="hidden" name="t" id="id1" title="some title" value="some numeric value" /><input type="hidden" name="t" id="id2" title="some title" value="some numeric value" /><input type="hidden" name="t" id="id3" title="some title" value="some numeric value" />and i put them all on my var x = document.getElementsByName("t")now i want to sort them on var x according to their value (descending).. and i want the actual elements to switch places not just the values they carry coz i need some of their html attributes to be preserved..ive made a little code but it doesnt seem to work.. any help would be appreciated..for(var i = 1; i < x.length; i++) { if(x.value > x[i-1].value) { var tmp = x[i-1]; x[i-1] = x; x = tmp; } }this doesnt work...any help?

[jeffman]

Be careful with getElementsByName. It's a recent addition to the DOM, and older browsers may not support it.In any case, methods like that do not return true arrays, They return dynamic node collections. That means they do not support most array methods and properties, and elements cannot be reassigned. To do that kind of stuff, you'd need to copy the collection into an array.This is why it might be easier to build the array using a different technique in the first place.Once you have an array, you might look at JavaScript's built-in array.sort() method. You'll need to use a hook function so that sort operates on the element values instead of the elements themselves.Try this:

function mySort () {   function byElValue (a, b) {	  return a.value - b.value;   }   var inputs = document.getElementsByTagName('input');   var textinputs = [];   var len = inputs.length;   for (var i = 0; i < len; ++i) {	  if (inputs[i].type.toLowerCase() == "text") {		 textinputs.push(inputs[i]);	  }   }   return textinputs.sort(byElValue);}

Note that this only gives you a sorted array. It does not rearrange the elements on the page. That's a whole other thing. But the array is the correct way to begin, if that's what you want.

[Lohmeyer]

thats exactly what i wanted..thanks!basically copy the collection into a true array and then use the sort function.. no wonder i cant use push, shift and unshift earlier..the only modifications i made wasb.value - a.value to make it descendingand the filtering

inputs[i].type.toLowerCase() == "text"

into

inputs[i].name == "t"

to capture only those i wantgreat help! thanks alot!

[jeffman]

I spent a really agonizing afternoon some time back figuring our that node collections don't have array properties. That's my role here. I endured the pain so you don't have to.